Who is ‘fedora man’? Dapper French teenager in viral Louvre heist photo unmasked | France

When 15-year-old Pedro Elias Garzon Delvaux realized that the Associated Press photo taken at the Louvre on the day of the crown jewel heist had been viewed millions of times, his first instinct was not to run to the Internet and unmask himself.

Quite the opposite. Pedro, a fan of Sherlock Holmes and Hercule Poirot and living with his parents and grandparents in Rambouillet, 30 km (19 mi) from Paris, decided to pursue the mystery further.

While theories swirled about the smartly dressed stranger (detective, insider, AI fraud) who had been shot by the “fellow hat man,” he decided to remain silent and watch.

“I didn’t want to immediately say it was me,” he said. “There is mystery in this photo, so you have to make it last.”

Pedro is a bright young man who accidentally steps into a global story.

The photograph that made him famous was intended to document a crime scene. Hours after thieves raided the French crown jewels in broad daylight, three police officers lean against a silver cart blocking the entrance to the Louvre. To the right, a lone figure in a three-piece suit strides past; a flash of film noir in today’s manhunt.

The internet did the rest. The “Fedora man,” as users called him, has starred as an old-school detective, an inside man, a Netflix speakeasy, or someone who isn’t human at all. Many believed that it was created by artificial intelligence.

Pedro understood why. “In the photo, I am dressed more in the 1940s, we are in 2025,” he said. “There is a contrast.”

Even some relatives and friends hesitated until they saw his mother in the background. Only then did they know for sure: The Internet’s favorite fake detective was a real kid.

The real story was simple. Pedro, his mother and grandfather came to visit the Louvre.

“We wanted to go to the Louvre, but it was closed,” he said. “We didn’t know it was a robbery”

They asked the officers why the doors were closed. Seconds later, AP photographer Thibault Camus, who was documenting the cordon, caught Pedro in the middle of the road.

“I didn’t know when the photo was taken,” Pedro said. “I was just passing by.”

Four days later, an acquaintance texted me: Is that you?

“He told me there were 5 million views,” he said. “I’m a little surprised.”

Then his mother called and said he was in the New York Times. “Not every day,” he said. Cousins ​​in Colombia, friends in Austria, family friends and classmates tracked them down with screenshots and calls.

“People said, ‘You became a star,’” he said. “I was surprised that just one photo could go viral in a matter of days.”

The image that shook tens of millions is not a costume prepared for a museum tour. Pedro started dressing this way less than a year ago, inspired by 20th-century history and black-and-white images of suit-clad statesmen and fictional detectives.

“I like to be stylish,” she said. “This is how I go to school.”

What about the hat? No, it’s his own ritual. Fedora is reserved for weekends, holidays, and museum visits.

He understands why people portray him as the quintessential sleuth: the unlikely heist, the unlikely detective. She likes Poirot, who is “very elegant”, and likes the idea that an extraordinary crime requires someone who looks extraordinary. “You can’t imagine a normal detective when something unusual happens,” he said. “You dream of someone different.”

This instinct suits the world he comes from. His mother, Félicité Garzon Delvaux, grew up in an 18th-century museum-palace as the daughter of a curator and an artist, and regularly takes her son to exhibitions.

“Art and museums are living spaces,” he said. “Life without art is not life.”

For Pedro, art and images were part of daily life. So when millions of people projected stories onto a single shot of him in a sombrero next to armed police in the Louvre, he recognized the power of an image and let the legend breathe.

He remained silent for a few days, then changed his Instagram from private to public.

“People should have tried to find out who I was,” he said. “Then journalists came and I told them my age. They were very surprised.”

Whatever happens from now on is comfortable. “I’m waiting for people to contact me for the film,” he said with a grin. “That would be hilarious.”