Angus Cloud’s Beauty Extended Beyond TV and Into Fashion

Angus Cloud, the actor best known for his breakout role on HBO’s Euphoria, passed away on Monday at age 25, sending shock waves through an industry that’s seen far too many young, talented stars go too soon.

Cloud played the empathetic drug dealer Fezco on Euphoria, instantly winning over fans with his languid line deliveries, sleepy eyes, and unbothered air of a person who’s seen too much dark shit go down to be bothered by petty high school problems. He was a star and a total natural, and had the Cinderella origin story to boot: He was discovered by a Euphoria casting director who spotted him walking down the street in Manhattan and plucked him out of obscurity.

Cloud was also one of those rare performers whose startlingly direct presence was perfectly suited to high fashion: a world that initially greeted him with skepticism—“Angus Cloud Is Fashion Week’s Unlikely New Star,” a Vogue headline declared last year—but eventually embraced him completely.

As his star rose thanks to Euphoria, Cloud began appearing in the front row at high-profile fashion shows, including Balmain in 2020, Ralph Lauren, and Alexandre Mattiussi. But his most enduring connection in the fashion world would be his relationship with Amiri, which made Cloud the face of the brand in 2022.

“On behalf of myself and the AMIRI family, we would like to express our heartbreak at the news of our friend Angus Cloud’s passing,” lead designer Mike Amiri said this week. “Through our time together, we were lucky to witness a great talent whose creativity was rivaled only by his compassion for others. Our prayers and thoughts are with his family, friends, and all those who had the privilege of knowing him.”

Cloud fit perfectly into the fickle high-fashion world because he had a killer sense of style that was all his own. From Burberry-patterned matching sets, to a classic tuxedo, to an Obama beanie paired with a Ralph Lauren teddy bear sweater, all of it looked right on him.

“I grew up in thrift stores,” Cloud told i-D just four months ago. “You have to find your own style, let your style develop. It’s not something that you can just take from a book. Style is how you hold yourself.”

That loose, confident approach to fashion was on full display as he posed in campaigns for Amiri, Ralph Lauren, and Billionaire Boys Club. He held himself like a wild animal in repose, seemingly completely relaxed.

He brought that same energy to Euphoria, where Cloud’s mastery was in his contradictions. On the show, Fez sells drugs to Zendaya’s Rue, but Cloud’s approach to his character clearly communicates his care and concern for Rue. “There was an ironic feeling of safety whenever Rue would show up to Fez’s house looking for drugs—his most heroic moment on the show being when he refused to give them to her,” The Daily Beast’s Kyndall Cunningham wrote.

Now, in the wake of his shocking death—which happened just two months after his father died—Cloud’s contradictions are on heartbreakingly full display. On screen and in still images, his ease is unmistakable, but beneath the surface he may have been grappling with more turmoil than he let on; the actor had previously been candid about his struggles with mental health and addiction. (The cause of his death is currently unknown).

“We are deeply saddened to see this tremendously talented artist gone too soon,” Puma, another collaborator, said of Cloud this week. “Our thoughts are with his family and loved ones and anyone struggling with mental health issues.”

What made Cloud so perfect for fashion was not his beauty nor his swagger, but the intensely swirling emotional world you could perceive just beneath the surface of his impassive, guarded facial expressions. He filled out the clothes he wore with streetwise apathy and elegance, letting you see that he was both a totally original person of his own creation, and also a stoic, even classic American everyman. And in Cloud, those contradictions found harmony.