In a world full of upheaval and weightier concerns, Germans have at least one bright fixture: their chancellor's colorful suit jackets, and occasional plunging neckline at the opera.
A point of much commentary and amusement to sartorial Germans the chancellor herself has remained unmoved.
"For a man, wearing a dark blue suit for a hundred days in a row is no problem at all, but if I wear the same blazer four times in two weeks, citizens write to me," Angela Merkel once told Zeit newspaper.
For 16 years, Merkel has met global leaders, citizens, attended parliament and gone about her business in an array of smart jackets, the same in shape, different in color.
She has also attended almost every annual Wagner opera festival in Bayreuth in southern Germany with her husband during her summer holiday, a couple of times in a low neckline which got her onto the front pages of the tabloids, where opera wouldn't normally feature.
Wagner's work has played to sold out crowds at the festival since the mid-1950s, with eager opera enthusiasts often waiting as long as 10 years for tickets to the Bayreuth Festspielhaus theater.
The annual opera frenzy is a highlight of German cultural life, providing both scandal and entertainment.
Another cultural occasion in Norway saw the chancellor sporting a plunging neckline at an Oslo opera house that created a media sensation in Germany at the time.
"Now she can relax and be a girl and can do as she does in Bayreuth and say hurrah I have two breasts. I think she can do it all, I mean she is a woman and is a big girl now!" German fashion designer Guido Maria Kretschmer told Reuters during Berlin Fashion Week.
"What should she have worn other than her 'look' she was always with men, was she supposed to come in a skirt suit? I think it was good, the way she did it. Now she can wear her necklaces or hang out in her tracksuit, or just go wild if she wants. I think she can do what she wants, wear a dirndl (southern German traditional dress) maybe there's a look she wants to try out. I think she can do anything she wants, it was the right look for her time (as chancellor)," he added.
But the woman from the former Communist East has done more than her detractors ever expected and she could even overtake her former mentor Helmut Kohl to become Germany's longest serving chancellor if it takes a long time to form a coalition government after the Sept. 26 election.
Woman's rights activist and publicist Alice Schwarzer said she was proud of how Merkel has held her own among powerful men: "There is a joke in Germany: a small boy asks, mum, can men also become chancellor? One person proved it and now it is out there and no-one can take that away now."
Despite the fact that Merkel wears unfussy trouser suits that downplay her femininity, Schwarzer said the chancellor still has a certain feminine charm that she uses in dealings with world leaders like French President Emmanuel Macron.
"We are women at the end of the day. And she tried to downplay this as much as possible; with her dress style. Matter-of-fact, comfortable, jacket and trousers. Flat shoes. No false coquetry. And yet at the same time I find that she has a very specific charm. I would say she is somewhere between girl and comrade. She has something girlish about her and is more than able to flirt!" she told Reuters.
With days to go until the federal election many Germans have never known anything except "Angie."
The daughter of a protestant pastor, Merkel grew up in Communist East Germany before taking the helm of a predominantly male, Catholic, western German party, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU). Armed with a doctorate in quantum chemistry, Merkel has adopted a pragmatic, problem-solving approach to government, guiding Germany - and Europe.
REUTERS