Celebrities are breaking on Monday on the steps of the extravagant gala of the Metropolitan Museum in new York, marked this year by a theme that resonates particularly with news: fashion through black diasporas in the United States.
Like every first Monday in May, the marches of the prestigious 5th avenue de Manhattan museum, backed by Central Park, crowds of fashionistas wait for long hours on the sidewalks, to hope to capture a star image on their smartphone.
Among the first to dazzle these “fashion Oscars”, the actress and musician Teyana Taylor posed in an endless detail outfit: cane in hand, feather hat on her head, she wears a costume enhanced with silver chains on a stuck vest with buttons, all under an impressive reddish cape where roses appear.
The high priestess of the event, the director of Vogue Anna Wintour, has arrived, just like some of the co-chairs of the 2025 edition: actor Colman Domingo, whose royal blue cape with white collar pays tribute to the late André Leon Talley-the first African-American creative director at Vogue, the Formula 1 pilot Lewis Hamilton in impeccable cream and diamonds. Brilliant, or even the artist Pharrell Williams, now creator at Louis Vuitton, who has a short white jacket encrusted with pearls.
At the foot of the steps, they listened to a choir singing the song “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough” made famous by Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terll.
– “New reason for being” –
As usual, the theme of the evening coincides with the great exhibition of the Costume Institute of the Metropolitan Museum: this year, the Met promises an exploration of American fashion since the 18th century through clothing styles first imposed on black populations in the United States and Europe, but that the latter have reclaimed and reinvented. Like the black dandies, an aesthetic inherited from slavery which has become synonymous with elegance and emancipation.
The exhibition, prepared for months, is part of the quest for diversity of American cultural institutions, five years after the immense wave of anti-racist protest of the movement “Black Lives Matter” after the death of an African-American, George Floyd, killed by the police.
But it takes on a particular dimension when Donald Trump, returned to power, abolishes federal funds on any initiative to promote diversity, which he castigates as a “WOKE” drift weakening meritocracy.
“It is obvious that this exhibition was planned many years ago and that we did not know what would happen in the political arena, but it takes on a new importance and a new reason for being,” Anna Wintour underlined.
– “Our talents, our history” –
Among the expected guests are the champion of gymnastics Simone Biles and the sprinter Sha’Carri Richardson, alongside the filmmaker and fan of the “Knicks” Spike Lee, but also of the new Rap Doechii star. On the other hand, the legend of basketball LeBron James, who had the title of honorary president of the gala, said, because of a knee injury.
When the theme had been announced last October, Pharrell Williams, whose brand sponsors the exhibition of the “Institute costume”, had stressed the importance of celebrating cultures from slavery, which still haunts American society.
“We are the survivors of what the worst trials are perhaps ever suffered by a group of human beings, and not only have we survived, but we have worn music, culture, beauty and universal language through an ocean and four centuries,” he launched.
“This is what the Met Gala will celebrate: we, our talents, our history, our gastronomy, our resilience and our beauty, our style and our strength,” he added.
The gala and its climb of the steps are one of the most selective events on the planet, which aims to finance the “costume institute”. This year, the party is expected to bring in $ 31 million, the Director General of the Met Max Hollein unveiled on Monday. According to the New York Times, the place at dinner costs $ 75,000, 350,000 for a table.
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