Case closed.
The natty, fedora-wearing, French “detective’’ at the center of a sensational photo mystery outside the Louvre Museum after last month’s jewel heist has finally been unmasked — as a 15-year-old boy.
Pedro Elias Garzon Delvaux, a k a “Fedora Man,” sparked a frenzy when he was snapped wearing his brown hat at the perfect jaunty angle, a fashionable vest and classy tie while wielding a wooden-handled umbrella — and a knowing look — as he stood by cops guarding an entrance at the world-famous Parisian art mecca Oct. 19, just after the wild theft.
But the boy cosplayer had kept his identity a secret — till now.
“I didn’t want to say immediately it was me,” he said in an interview with The Associated Press. “With this photo, there is a mystery, so you have to make it last.”
Delvaux claimed he was simply visiting the museum at the time with his parents — and didn’t even know there had just been a robbery there — when his picture was taken by French photographer Thibault Camus.
The cosplayer is a Sherlock Holmes and Hercule Poirot fan, and said he often attends his uniform-free school in the 1940’s-inspired apparel.
His full get-up includes a Yves Saint Laurent waistcoat borrowed from his father, jacket, a tie, Tommy Hilfiger trousers and a restored Russian watch.
Delvaux said he only wears the fedora on weekends, holidays, and museum trips.
He said that four days after his photo went viral, a friend messaged him, asking if he was the world’s new favorite sleuth.
“People said, ‘You’ve become a star,’ ” Delvaux said. “I was astonished that just with one photo you can become viral in a few days.”
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The teen said that at first, he hid from the Internet, keeping his social media private to avoid any unwanted attention. Many online posited that the picture may be artificially generated.
After several days of letting the theories swirl, Delvaux changed his accounts back to the public and stepped into the limelight.
“Then journalists came, and I told them my age. They were extremely surprised,” Delvaux said.
On his Instagram, Delvaux writes that he’s available for future PR collaborations.
“When something unusual happens, you don’t imagine a normal detective,” Delvaux said. “You imagine someone different.”
