Meet Alonso Mateo, Instagram’s Five-Year-Old Style Icon

With the help of his stylist mom, this little boy shows off his sophisticated fashion sense to scores of Instagram followers.

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Luisa Fernanda Espinosa

Would you take style cues from a five-year-old boy? When he’s as put-together and dapper as Alonso Mateo, it’s hard not to take notes. With more than 22,000 Instagram followers, five fan accounts dedicated to his style and fans outside his house asking to take his picture, Alonso may be the youngest fashion icon yet.

It all started when his mom, Luisa Fernanda Espinosa — a freelance stylist who has contributed to Harper’s Bazaar Mexico and Latin America — started posting pics of Alonso on her Instagram account last year (@luisafere, which boasts over 133,000 followers and she has recently set to private). Every morning before school, she helps her son pick out outfits in his personal walk-in closet, though he’s the chief stylist. “I’ll help him coordinate outfits so that they make sense, but mostly it’s him,” she recently told The Cut. Luisa adores Opening Ceremony and can’t live without her Alexander Wang T-shirts, so we can only imagine how delighted she is to share her passion with the little one: There are plenty of pics of them happily posing together on Instagram.

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Alonso and his family — which also includes his dad, the owner and CEO of a private equity firm — have lived in Laguna Beach, Calif., for two years, where they moved from Monterrey, Mexico. By all accounts, mom and dad haven’t let the adoration go to Alonso’s head: While he seems to like taking “selfies” and there’s a sense of fun around his pics, he also tends to get shy in front of fans, like any five-year-old would. And Luisa’s not quite sure whether Alonso’s got the fashion world figured out yet: “I don’t think he really notices he’s fashion forward. He’s too young.”

Alonso was “discovered” by celebrity stylist Ugo Mozie last year, when he tweeted “Style icon. Get familiar and take notes” along with pictures of Alonso decked out in Tom Ford, Gucci and AllSaints. “What first caught my eye about him was his confidence,” Mozie told The Cut. “His clothes were exceptionally tailored, drop-crotch pants, his hand in his pocket — that stood out to me.”