This year at the Met Gala they all played it safe

For a Met Gala with such progressive premises, the looks we saw yesterday on the red carpet (or rather, blue carpet) were quite conservative this year. With the theme centered on the Black Dandy and thus focused on the intersection between tailoring and the identity of Afro-descendant communities both inside and outside America, this year's event was a parade of eveningwear and white-tie ensembles reimagined in rather interesting ways in some cases. The clear standouts of the evening were Sergio Hudson, Wales Bonner, Marc Jacobs, and Thom Browne – while stars like Rihanna, Diana Ross, Andre 3000, Damson Idris, Khaby Lame, Christian Latchman, and Lupita Nyong'o, as well as Lana del Rey, Jeff Goldblum, Hunter Schafer, and Emma Chamberlain offered truly memorable looks. The best look was the first one, worn by Teyana Taylor, which perfectly embodied the theme. The most questionable look was that of Amelia Gray, who showed up in a custom Valentino outfit that included a durag and somehow managed to both fully cover the model and still give the impression of undressing her—without, however, being sexy at all – more Grey Gardens than Amelia Gray. The most niche look, instead, was archival: Jeremy Pope in a Maison Margiela bustier from the FW97 collection – not particularly flashy in photos, but a very cerebral choice for an evening dominated by jackets and ties.

And beyond the brands and designers who clearly had fun creating their looks—Alessandro Michele first and foremost—it was perhaps odd to see Louis Vuitton take so few risks despite being the event’s sponsor: yes, Pharrell’s pearl blazer was haute couture-level, but the rest of the outfit was decidedly basic and the tie knot was off (despite his role as a co-chair of the Gala); all the women dressed by the brand were practically in underwear and the mega-star Lisa (admittedly stunning from the waist up) had Rosa Parks’ face embroidered on her lace culottes – and frankly, we don’t know how happy Rosa Parks would have been to be featured on a piece of lingerie. Elsewhere, both Doechii, Pusha T, and Future wore more structured but very commercial outfits.

The theme of “commercial” was not secondary on last night's red carpet: not only logos and bags often prominently displayed and clearly meant to flaunt a label, but also looks that in some cases seemed lifted directly from the runway or created without much mental effort. Zendaya and Anna Sawai, for instance, wore the exact same look – a reference to Diana Ross in Mahogany, sure, but such overlap is frankly unforgivable for the Met Gala, considering the brands dressing them (Louis Vuitton and Dior) are part of the world’s largest and wealthiest luxury conglomerate. The women dressed by Saint Laurent wore simple black suits – strange for a brand that counts among its muses Mounia Orosemane, who was dressed by founder Yves in a thousand different ways had they needed references. Even Haider Ackermann's Tom Ford didn’t venture far – and McQueen’s looks were drawn directly from the runway. The same goes for at least a couple of Valentino’s looks, although Lana del Rey’s outfit, which was stunning, came straight from the Haute Couture collection. A disappointment, sad to say, was A$AP Rocky, dressed head-to-toe in his brand AWGE, but who unfortunately wore a black suit and tie under a three-quarter trench coat which, aside from the jewelry, was more “minimal” than minimalist. Overall, the predominance of jackets and black and white looks created the impression of a more stylistically restrained Met Gala and, overall, of a group of elegant outfits in which the more visually heavy or exceptional looks got lost in a general impression of good taste and composure.

While men played a lot with jewelry and many women ditched pants or skirts, over the course of the evening, a curious trend was observed, perhaps inspired by the theme of men’s tailoring: a series of female looks attempting to mix skirts and trains with tuxedo trousers but with mixed results. Andra Day, Jennie Kim, Mona Patel, Coco Jones, Keke Palmer, Jennifer Goicoechea Raymond, Ego Nwodim, Deborah Roberts, and Jodie Turner-Smith all wore a variation of this look. Cynthia Erivo in Givenchy came close: jacket and skirt were there, but the front part of the latter was missing, leaving her legs exposed – conceptually it’s nearly the same silhouette. A very Y2K-coded style that had a curious counterpoint in Emma Chamberlain’s Courrèges look and especially in her pre-2005 hairstyle. Likewise, several looks that channeled the dandy's Victorian soul with exaggerated shapes recalled the fascination two decades ago with the circus and burlesque world in a 19th-century key.

The same impression was given by the many wide-brimmed hats or others with a ‘40s/‘50s vibe, closely resembling the fedoras ubiquitous in that decade. The one who looked like she came straight from a party twenty years ago was Anne Hathaway, and with her shirt and long skirt she had never looked so “business casual.” Which is odd because fashion collectively has been circling around that decade for some years now, undecided whether to land in the bling era or the 2008 financial crisis one. Could it be that, weeks or months from now, we’ll read unequivocal recession indicators in this Met Gala? With Trump’s tariffs, we may find out soon. But perhaps, considering the announcement that this year’s Met raised 31 million dollars, a record amount compared to last year’s 26 million, this Met Gala was a success. And given the political climate in which it took place, namely Trump's increasingly closed-off America, one could think that the greater aesthetic rigor seen on this year’s red carpet was deliberate – to make it more “Gala” and less “Met”.