It was the Bezos Met Gala. Lauren Sánchez Bezos, in her strapless Schiaparelli gown, was one of the first to arrive. Her husband? Well, he was nowhere to be seen. After all the chatter about this being the oligarch’s gala — an event chaired by one of the world’s richest men that spurred protests and a few boycotts — Bezos quietly slipped in, bypassing the journalists and its attendant cameras altogether.
Nonetheless, there was a undercurrent of anxiety in the air on Monday, after all that talk of protests and ill feelings. It was amplified, per reporters at the event, after a protester tried to crash the carpet early in the evening. He was quickly carried away by the police. Still, as Anna Wintour shared on Monday morning at remarks introducing the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s new fashion exhibition, this was the most successful Met Gala ever, having raised $42 million. Cries of elitism haven’t gummed up the Met Gala machine. Yet.
And indeed, this was, when all was over, a Met Gala like any other. For better and, well, for worse. There was La La Anthony on the Vogue livestream, saying “stunning” more times than any human on record. There were gowns with trains as super-scaled as parachutes. And there was Rihanna, arriving, oh, just about an hour after we all thought the carpet would close.
There were also, duh, outfits — wondrous ones, whimsical ones and WTF ones. Who worked? I’m pinning a gold star to Teyana Taylor, in a frosty fringed Tom Ford frock that made her look like a royal yeti. And I’ll throw one to Chase Infiniti, in her Thom Browne dress with a scintillating print of a body, like a still-wet watercolor.
She was one of the few to nail the fashion is art theme. As was the tennis champ Naomi Osaka, in a Robert Wun dress with blood red flowers sprouting from its slits like puncture wounds. And a special mention to Eileen Gu in her Iris van Herpen minidress, which blew bubbles as she made her way up the carpet.
If there was a general trend it was that nipples are the new naked dressing. Flashing skin is out a provocation, but showing the idea of a nipple? That evidently is very in.
And what of the men? Oy, the men. What a poor showing. Still, I did have a soft spot for the pair in bluejeans: Troye Sivan in Prada and the designer Olivier Rousteing. A risk for the carpet, but a winky one. (Rousteing, who left Balmain not long ago, designed a crystal exoskeleton gown for Beyoncé. If you’re going to tease your own brand, there’s no better celeb you can get than Bey. Well-played.)
But one guy’s outfit truly stood out as the gold standard: the Margiela designer Glenn Martens’s pin-sharp double-breasted tux. (Perhaps it’s unfair to praise a designer. He of all people should be able to cut a suit properly. But you’d be surprised how few miss this mark.) Do you disagree with these picks? Well, weigh in on who you thought was the best dressed here. That is, only after catching up on the some of the highlights, and big yikes, from the Met Gala that was.
Getting Handsy
Many guests showed up with an extra set of appendages crawling over their dress — especially … well, over their breasts. The Blackpink singer and rapper Lalisa Manobal, who goes by Lisa, wore a white, diamond-encrusted gown that featured two additional arms protruding from her shoulders, holding a dramatic veil over her head. Nichapat Suphap, the Thai fashion consultant and editor, posed on the carpet wearing a black mermaid-style gown adorned with several silver hands cupping her breasts, hip and thigh. Finally, the Tony Award-winning producer and performer Jordan Roth wore a gray velvet frock with a matching anatomical structure towering over his shoulders that resembled a conjoined twin. — Gina Cherelus
Putting the Costume in the Costume Institute Gala
Heidi Klum, the host of “Project Runway,” who has seemingly never come across a dress code she couldn’t commit to, turned up dressed as a statue, the kind you might find inside the Greek and Roman wing of the Met. As she stood on the red carpet, Klum looked as if she had a flowing veil draped around her head in her custom Mike Marino look. But the whole piece was made from latex and was immovably affixed to her face. Her hands and feet, peeking out from under the veil, were painted white like alabaster, down to her nails.
“I look hard, but I’m soft,” Klum said on the Vogue livestream. — Alisha Haridasani Gupta
No Reverse Aging for Bad Bunny
There was one unexpected question ricocheting around the Met Gala red carpet (and on social media): “Who’s unc?” Causing the stir amid a procession of collagen-filled faces and teenage midriffs was a graying figure in a satin-silk black tuxedo, propping himself up with a walking cane. The answer was none other than Bad Bunny, who was disguised as a venerable senior, dressed in a suit by Zara, unflinchingly staring down the cameras.
Bad Bunny, who was a host of the Met Gala in 2024, explained that his look took “53 years” to prepare. “It’s a perfect day to explore and be creative and express yourself in a different way,” he said. “It took a little bit, but I hope it was worth it.” — Nathan Taylor Pemberton
But what about the exhibition?
On Monday morning, I slipped around the Barnum-size white tent plopped at the entrance of the Met to attend a preview of “Costume Art.” The show endeavors to make the case (yes, this saw again) that fashion is an art form, by juxtaposing artifacts from the museum’s holdings with dresses and suits. I personally think the clothes could have stood alone. Really, if fashion is an art form, these clothes need to be able to stand on their own in a museum. You wouldn’t, after all, situate a watercolor next to a Grecian urn to validate the painting.
The show has its standouts, including an unsettling skull-embroidered jacket from the Japanese label Undercover, whose coarse stitches recalls hospital sutures; a Robert Wun 2024 couture dress, which uses some of the most impressive beadwork I’ve ever seen up close to depict an exaggerated anatomy; and the Dutch artist Imme van der Haak’s diaphanous dress printed with the image of an elderly woman. They all convey something subversive, confrontational even, about what the human body can look like when covered in cloth and thread.
The indelible fit of the day
As I left the Met, I had to chase down the stylist and longtime Bill Cunningham subject, Lana Turner. I mean, the hat alone! It was like an antique throw pillow situated on her head. Turner made it herself. She also fabricated her gloves and her earrings. Turner’s outfit was as invigorating as anything in the galleries, yet she doesn’t consider herself a designer. “I see myself as someone who has figured out that art is who you are,” she said.
Jacob Gallagher is a Times reporter covering fashion and style.
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