With all due respect to The Academy Awards, the place where celebrities show up every year with the most dramatic career-changing fashion statements is New York’s Met Gala. There, on the red carpeted steps of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Vogue’s Anna Wintour holds court and welcomes attendees to the black-tie fundraising event for The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute.
And the goal isn’t to necessarily to look stunning, so much as it is to stun, to present an artistic statement, and of course, to get as much attention as possible. This all coincides with a different theme each year, and this year’s was “Karl Lagerfeld: A Line of Beauty.” Lagerfeld, the late designer who worked for luxury brands including Patou, Chloé, Balmain, Fendi, Chanel, as well as his own label, was a controversial choice this year. After decades of remarks considered racist, homophobic, and intolerant of women’s bodies and dismissive of sexual assault, Lagerfeld’s legacy had alienated a solid portion of the fashion community—including the models who protested the Gala’s theme a day before the event.
But The Met Gala is a show, and the show must go on. And in this case that meant celebrity attendees posing on the red carpet in looks that paid homage to Lagerfeld’s career of six-plus decades, spanning designs he created for every label he’s worked for, with lots and lots of homages to his many black and white ensembles, plenty of pinks, and his signature pearls, flowers, and black shades. Here are ten looks I loved — not for their audaciousness (that award goes to Jared Leto for dressing as Lagerfeld’s cat, Choupette; or to Lil Nas X, who showed up in head-to-toe silver body paint) or necessarily because they honored Lagerfeld, but for the beauty and artistry they brought to the scene.
Naomi Campbell (who started working with Lagerfeld when she was 16 and, it should be said, still looks incredible) was one of many who wore an absolutely gorgeous shell pink Chanel Couture dress.
Bad Bunny in a white, backless Simon Porte Jacquemus suit, punctuated with a frilly and ultra-long train festooned with fantastic white fabric flowers. It’s about time men got to have some sartorial fun.
Dua Lipa charmed in demure Chanel Couture — a white tweed gown (with pockets), inspired by one Claudia Schiffer wore in the early ‘90s.
Nicole Kidman in drop-dead stunning pale pink, feathered number — a dress Lagerfeld designed for her twenty years ago for a Chanel No. 5 ad — topped with devil-may-care undone hair.
Viola Davis was electrifying in a fuchsia Valentino showcasing a significant feather plume at the bust and scattered feathers along the bodice.
Anne Hathaway in a remixed dress with lots of Lagerfeld tropes — chains and camellia flowers with tweed stitched together around cutouts. It was a throwback pastiche and an absolute win.
Olivia Wilde seemed ready for a fabulous medieval battle in white Chloé with a capelet top and armor-like gold cuffs and front design, flanked with side cutouts at the waist.
Gisele Bündchen in a white Chanel Couture dress with shimmering panels and (yes more!) feathers all over an enormous flowing cape — which she flapped about for extra drama. Most remarkable, though, was her huge smile.
Penélope Cruz looked every inch the part of one of the evening’s chairs in ultra-white white Chanel Couture, sparkling with silver beading and a sheer hood. Her history with Lagerfeld also goes way back; he selected her as a house ambassador for Chanel decades ago.
Jessica Chastain showed up as a platinum blonde in Gucci — a sheer black confection held up by a bustier followed by a frilled skirt, a flowing sheer black train, and a Lagerfeld classic: big black Wayfarers.
