The Met Gala
The Met Gala was last night!
This year, the theme of the Met Gala was Karl Lagerfeld, one of the greatest fashion minds of the 20th century, so everyone was either supposed to wear stuff designed by Karl during his tenures at Chanel or Fendi or Chloe or his eponymous label, or copy Karl’s preoccupations, his love of tweed and pearls and camellias and bows and apparently cats; his hatred of saturated color.
As a very dedicated Met ball watcher, these are always difficult Met Balls, Met Balls dedicated to one very brilliant personality (Two others, Charles James and Alexander McQueen immediately come to mind as equally wack). They are the “to have or have not” Met Balls, as I like to call them. If you are wearing something actually designed by the genius at hand, you look amazing. But if you are wearing something designed by a random person trying to encapsulate the genius you generally look idiotically camp and the anxiety of influence is obvious and sad.
Anyway.
Sometimes I wonder if this newsletter is really just written by Joan Rivers A Piece of Work back from the dead, but anyway here it is, another review of red carpet, the best and also worst.
Best Pearls: Lizzo in Chanel
There were a lot of pearls on the Karl Karpet this evening, notably on Kim Kardashian, Karlie Kloss and many other people who didn't have names that started with K, but no one wore pearls quite as beautifully as Lizzo. It helped that this was based on an original Karl 1992 design, and the absolute brilliance of the pearls as both crew neck and stripe totally eclipsed the “brothel-owner in old timey western” pearls on almost everyone else.
Best White 3-D Flower: Maya Hawke in Prada
Another common trend on the carpet tonight were white 3-d flowers made into a huge coat. Rihanna did it, Alexa Chung also did it and paired it with some kind of amish 3d flower bonnet for reasons unknown. This Prada version (Prada is no stranger herself to the 3-d flower) is by far the best, the coat commodious but also impeccably tailored in the shoulder, and paired brilliantly with a matching Chanel-esque mini and white tights.
Most unique Karl: Naomi Campbell
The lion share of people who wore vintage Karl chose to wear his feathery confections or his black and white chiffon trailing ballgowns or his elegant and unconventional wedding dresses. (See Penelope Cruz and Dua Lipa) And sure! Those are very iconic looks for Karl, but that’s why this gorgeous blush tunic on Naomi is so absolutely stunning. A kind of proto Roman toga over a silver floral breast plate, this shows how truly elegant and versatile Karl could be and how much his eye for beauty and attention to historicism was integral to his best work.
Best Early Karl Homage: Olivia Wilde and Margaret Zhang
When Lagerfeld was head designer for Chloe in the 70s, he reached back to the 30s for inspiration, taking out most embellishment and structure from his clothes and adding a faintly art deco geometry to his dresses. This Chloe on Olivia Wilde and Margaret Zhang (lol) called “The Violin dress” distills the best of Karl’s work during that time, and with its insouciant cut outs and literal violin center channels Karl’s own playfulness and disrespect for tradition.
Best Suit: Emma Chamberlain
One of the most unique aspects of Karl’s tenure at Chanel was the way he reconstituted Coco’s classic suit, cropping the jacket and slashing the skirt. I actually thought I would see more unconventional suiting on the carpet, but Emma’s Miu Miu is a perfect distillation of many of Karl’s best ideas, even referencing Karl’s love of a drop waist and matching wide fabric belt.
Best Revenge Dress: Gisele
Good for you. I hate him.
Worst cat: everyone doing stuff with the cat
A lot of people did cat stuff and frankly I hated it.
And in no particular order my bests that I could not buy pictures of because it was getting expensive: Allison Williams, Anne Hathaway, Lila Moss, Sean Jean, Gigi Hadid, hot tennis players, Margot Robbie, The guy who designs Balmain, Sabrina Dhowre Elba, Maya Penn, Teyana Taylor, everything Sergio Hudson did, Simu Liu, Marion Cotillard, Karen Elson.