Red Velvet's Irene May Be Hinting At A Prada Endorsement—And She'd Be Perfect For It

Red Velvet’s Irene is known for working with some of the world’s biggest brands, from Chamisul (the most-sold liquor in the world) to Clinique (a major international beauty brand). Now, fans think she may be hinting at a new endorsement contract with none other than luxury Italian fashion house Prada.

On April 28, Irene uploaded a new set of 8 photos to her Instagram account, @renebaebae. In just 4 hours, the photoset had already surpassed 1 million likes.

She looked beautiful as usual in the photos, but there was something unique that caught ReVeluvs’ attention: the tag. Irene tagged Prada’s official Instagram account in her photos, showing off a blazer, knit t-shirt, and $2,000 bag from the brand.

It’s not uncommon for idols to tag brands they have no long-term contract with on Instagram. Usually, it simply means that the brand in question has gifted a piece of clothing to the idol. However, fans quickly noticed that Irene never tags brands she doesn’t directly work with.

Brands that Irene has tagged on her IG renebaebae account:

Chanel Beauty Korea
Miu Miu
Damiani
Clinique
Prada

She ONLY tags brands she’s currently working with. Miu Miu is a subsidiary of Prada but is she also working with them?👀 the shadow looks like she’s with her MUA too..

— irene bae (@renebaeby_) April 28, 2020

The only other brands she’s tagged on Instagram are Clinique and Damiani (which she’s an endorser for), Miu Miu (after being featured as a “Girl in Miu Miu” ambassador last year), and Chanel Beauty when she attended the brand’s event.

Naturally, this has fans suspicious of whether Irene is currently working with Prada behind the scenes. But that wasn’t the only part of the Instagram post that raised attention—so did the caption.

Irene captions her photos with emojis more often than she captions them with words. This time, her choice of emojis (a lemon, a winking face, and a green apple) seemed to have no correlation with the images she posted.

But one determined ReVeluv dug into Prada’s campaigns to see if they could find any hints. Lo and behold, green and yellow (the colors of the fruit emojis) seem to be a theme in Prada’s new pre-fall 2020 womenswear collection.

I just checked Prada's new pre-fall 2020 concept and I think I understand now ㅋㅋ pic.twitter.com/jZHv047Nke

— 슬린 유닛 (@joohyunisabae) April 28, 2020

They were also the main colors of Prada’s Hyper Leaves installation project, which Irene had been rumored to be a part of. The rumor never came true, but fans are unsure whether that’s simply because of recent COVID-19 restrictions.

Irene working with Prada certainly wouldn’t be a stretch of the imagination. After all, she’s worked with Miu Miu—a subsidiary brand of Prada itself. Alongside starring in their “Girl in Miu Miu” campaign, she also attended the brand’s Paris Fashion Week show in March 2019 and partnered with them for a VOGUE Korea photoshoot.

She was also invited the Prada Dreamscape pop-up store opening in December 2019.

Besides that, she’s been spotted wearing Prada outfits to the airport several times since late 2019. Before Irene officially worked with Miu Miu, she sported the brand’s outfits at the airport repeatedly for almost a year.

It seems Irene made quite an impression on Miuccia Prada, head of both Prada and Miu Miu, when they met. Who’s to say Ms. Prada didn’t decide to bring Irene on as an endorser or a muse?