Met Gala guests, from Beyoncé to Naomi Osaka, didn’t play it safe on Monday. Celebrities presented bespoke artwork in homage to this year’s theme, Fashion is an art (Fashion is art).
Beyoncé dazzled the audience in a custom-made sculptural dress by Olivier Rousteing, looking like a skeleton, with a cream and powder blue feathered train, also wearing a diamond crown. The Grammy award winner, accompanied by her husband Jay-Z and daughter Blue Ivy, stopped to pose with family on the red carpet.
Osaka made a splash in a dramatic sculptural white dress by Robert Wun, with exaggerated shoulders and adorned with red feathers, with a matching hat. A similar outfit by Wun is on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute’s “Costume Art” exhibit, which will be open to the public beginning May 10.
In the midst of all the excitement around The devil wears Prada 2Met Gala co-chair Anna Wintour opted for a mint-colored outfit. Wintour’s ensemble included a feathered cape and beaded dress by Matthieu Blazy for Chanel, which she styled classically with her signature bob and oversized sunglasses.
The other co-chairs of the evening, Nicole Kidman and Venus Williams, chose more sober outfits. Venus Williams wore a shimmering black off-the-shoulder dress, accented with a dazzling gemstone necklace, in homage to a portrait of herself by Robert Pruitt for the National Portrait Gallery.
Event sponsor Lauren Sánchez Bezos arrived in a form-fitting Schiaparelli dress, which she told Vogue was inspired by John Singer Sargent’s 1884 painting, Madame X.
Unlike last year’s blue carpet, this year’s seemed to have been deliberately forgotten by time. The carpet was dotted with clumps of overgrown grass protruding from the stone steps, with clipped shrubs lining the side railing. Potted purple flowers hung at the entrance to the carpet in large terracotta pots.
Other celebs who have graced the Met steps include Rihanna, Bad Bunny and the show’s Canadian actor Passionate rivalry Hudson Williams.
Dress codes for previous galas have paid homage to designers and were inspired by literature. Last year, the art of couture was in the spotlight with the dress code Custom designed for you (Tailored for you).
This highly publicized event raises funds for the Met’s Costume Institute, and each year the gala’s dress code is inspired by the Costume Institute’s spring exhibition.
The exhibition Costume Artpresented this spring, “explores representations of the dressed body,” we can read on the Met website.
