Dandyism, menswear and self-expression – stars showcased notable looks at the Met Gala 2025.
A daffodil-dressed carpet welcomed pinstripes, slick suiting and flamboyance to New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute Benefit today, as stars gathered to mark a historic exhibition at the museum.
As was announced
The academic explores how Black people within the Atlantic diaspora have used dress “to define their identity in different and changing political and cultural contexts”.
As a guest curator for Superfine: Tailoring Black Style, Dr Miller explained ahead of the exhibition’s opening that dandyism “asks questions about identity, representation and mobility in relation to race, class, gender, sexuality, and power. This exhibition explores dandyism as both a pronouncement and a provocation.”
The dress code for the carpet, Tailored For You, asked attendees to interpret these aesthetics around dandyism and suiting. Here were some of the most triumphant moments.
Lorde
Thom Browne dressed the New Zealand singer-songwriter. The outfit appears to fuse multiple cummerbunds, the sash that usually enrobes a waist underneath a tuxedo jacket. – Madeleine Crutchley
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Advertise with NZME.Rosalia and Olivier Rousteing
This pairing is storied. Rosalia wears a white gown with a sculptural matte bodice, mimicking the shape and texture of a mannequin. Balmain designer Olivier marks himself as a maker, pairing his sharp suit with a sewing machine. – MC
Tracee Ellis Ross
The pants were on-point – literally – and the look, by Marc Jacobs (with headwear by milliner Stephen Jones) was described by its wearer as “animated joy and artistry”. Actor Tracee Ellis Ross wore pink suiting with more imagination than most, but it was her music legend mother Diana Ross who had earlier shut down the carpet. The woman was once dubbed “the Queen of Motown records” made her first Met Gala appearance in 22 years in a gown adorned with crystals, beads and a sweeping 5.5m-long train embroidered with the names of her grandchildren and children. – Kim Knight
Bad Bunny
Bad Bunny tops his tonal, double-breasted Prada suit with a woven hat inspired by the pava – a straw hat often associated with Puerto Rican jíbaro (farmers). The embellished gloves also add a sense of play to the clever ensemble. - MC
Jeremy Pope
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Advertise with NZME.“There is no fashion without the frame,” Jeremy Pope told interviewers – and the actor and singer gave serious form in sleeveless 1997 Margiela. The entire outfit, including jewellery, was sourced from eBay. – KK
Keke Palmer
Keke Palmer’s gown, designed by Vera Wang, sources inspiration from Dorothy Dandridge (who became the first Black woman to be nominated for an Oscar for the titular role in Carmen Jones). The ensemble, which features a cascade of pearls, also draws in references to suiting – there’s the lapel of the neckline and those slick black trousers. – MC
Mary J. Blige
Cream suit – check. Gold trimmed hat – quadruple check. Musician Mary J. Blige said she was “doin’ it for the culture” in her fourth Met Gala appearance. She wore Stella McCartney but the real interest was, arguably, mostly above the brow line, thanks to the Stephen Jones is-it-or-isn’t-it hat. – KK
Ayo Edebiri
Ayo is always cool. Over a custom Ferragamo and Maximillian Davis dress, she wears a leather jacket with coat tails. The coral beading resembles Edo dress, drawing on her Nigerian heritage. – MC
Zendaya
It’s a sleek, monochromatic suit for Zendaya by Louis Vuitton. The hat is particularly excellent. Zendaya’s face is one fans and media wait to spot on this carpet – she asserts power in obscuring it. – MC
Colman Domingo
There are dress codes – and then there is coded dressing. Trawl through the blue-carpet video interviews for the history lessons delivered by Colman Domingo’s clothes. The actor (and co-chairman of this year’s event) removed a jewel-blue Valentino cape, which referenced ancient Moors, church choir robes, his mother’s favourite colour – and one of the first freed slaves, who said he wanted to dance at his freedom day in his finest blue super-fine wool. Underneath was this pattern-clashing suit. – KK
Laura Harrier
A billowing look from Laura Harrier. The shirt, denim waistcoat and pants are designed by Zac Posen for Gap Studio, with reference to various historically significant dandies. The sleeves really apply a sense of mobility – they’re an ultra-fine cotton and highlight every movement from the actor and model. – MC
Walton Goggins
He was a couple of decades too late for the Met Gala’s Braveheart: Men In Skirts theme (2003) but there was no denying the visibly tailored appeal of an inside-out Thom Browne ensemble in full twirl mode, as sported by this star of The White Lotus star. – KK
Dapper Dan
Influential designer Dapper Dan assumes the role of Harlem dandy with this black and white zoot suit, sparkling with sequins and gold embellishments. The back of his jacket is also emblazoned with the sankofa bird, a reference to the Ghanaian language Twi. It means “to retrieve” or “to go back and get” – in an interview with Vogue, the designer explained he saw a need to pull from the Harlem Renaissance era right now. – MC
ASAP Rocky
Down to the red-bottomed Christian Louboutins and the peekaboo boxers, co-chairman ASAP Rocky designed this look himself. He told Vogue he developed it in reference to the 1989 film Harlem Nights. – MC
Lewis Hamilton
The co-chairman was dressed by British designer Grace Wales Bonner, whose designs are also featured in the exhibition. He spotlighted the embellishments during his tour of the carpet, which include crystals and cowrie shells. The cream suit is an immaculate canvas to present them. – MC
Lizzo
Lizzo by the numbers? A reported 200 stitched seams, three layers of corset and three days to sew. The musician wore full-length and plunging Christian Siriano and carried an unlit cigarette in an elegantly extended cigarette holder because … nope, no idea. (But is it bad form to say it looked infinitely cooler than a vape and/or Madonna’s cigar?) – KK
Doechii
Pharrell Williams designed this Louis Vuitton suiting for Doechii, with reference to the dandyism of Julius Soubise, an Afro-Caribbean Londoner from the 18th century (Dr Miller references this figure in her book). The design leans into excess and mobility for its interpretation, with loud embossing of the Louis Vuitton logo across a neatly tailored jacket and pair of shorts. Doechii, who always seeks something cool, finds some grounding in oxblood red accessories. – MC
Teyana Taylor
Pleated, folded, feathered and oh so Teyana Taylored! The singer and dancer who performed hosting duties for Vogue declared this year’s gala the “swaggiest” ever – but she’d already set the bar stratospherically high in custom Marc Jacobs. – KK
Spike Lee
Obsessed with Spike Lee donning this New York Knicks hat. The director’s consistency for his basketball team has become a part of his public persona, so this accessorisation feels like a cheeky challenge to that construction. – MC
More about this year’s Met Gala theme and exhibition
In her 2009 formative cultural history, Slaves to Fashion: Black Dandyism and the Styling of Black Diasporic Identity, Dr Monica L. Miller tracks a transformation in Black style. She details the shift in dress from post-Emancipation to the Harlem Renaissance and through to the 1990s.
She classifies the transformation as being one “from costumed object designed to trumpet the wealth, status and power of white masters to self-styling subjects who use immaculate clothing, arch wit and pointed gesture to announce their often controversial presence”.
The latter defines contemporary Black dandyism as an intentional and assertive mode of dress which uses clothing to challenge, transcend, protest and converse with various hierarchies – social, cultural and political (though Black dandyism has had various connotations, complications and purposes in different eras and contexts). In Slaves To Fashion, Miller highlights contemporary examples like André 3000, Prince and the film Looking For Langston.
Inside the exhibition, for which Miller was guest curator, AP reports that garments are organised into 12 sections: ownership, presence, distinction, disguise, freedom, champion, respectability, jook, heritage, beauty, cool and cosmopolitanism.
On the Met Gala carpet, Miller spoke about the need to represent the pain and the joy, to include “the rhythm and the blues” of this fashion history. Contemporary designers featured within the exhibition include Grace Wales Bonner, Jacques Agbobly, Pharrell Williams and Virgil Abloh.
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Aotearoa Music Awards 2024: Behind Host Jesse Mulligan’s Red-Carpet Fashion. The stylist’s brief: current, cool and red-carpet ready.
