Met Gala 2024 live updates: Anna Wintour, Gwendoline Christie and a green red carpet | Met Gala 2024

Chloe McDonnell

Met Gala host and red carpet pro Jennifer Lopez arrived She wears a custom Schiaparelli dress that looks like it’s made of glittering crystals. Perhaps a nod to the crystallized flowers in JG Ballard’s book?

Co-chair and absolute queen of meta-dressing — check out the tennis ball heels she wore to promote sexy tennis movie, Challengers — Zendaya arrived Her stylist Lou Roach sent the internet into a frenzy with a red-herring Instagram post yesterday that read, “How did I forget I had this dress in my archive!… we’ve had the dress the whole time,” followed by an enoji facepalm. But Emanuel Ungaro’s couture dress with floral motifs, in which he posted a photo, was clearly not meant to be. Of course, Zendaya went for the drama in this unusual silhouette and feathering, which Vogue reports is vintage Christian Dior from the spring 1999 fashion collection.

Gwendoline Christie climbs the stairs at Maison Margiela

Chloe McDonnell

The The Met Gala is all about drama and British actress Gwendoline Christie certainly brings it, slowly climbing the steps and striking a different pose on each level. The GOT star wears a red velvet gown and sheer tulle cape by John Galliano for Maison Margiela. She closed his spring ’24 fashion show in January, so it’s only natural. Although we kind of wish she’d gone for that rubber corset look. It feels a little less adventurous, and tonight of all nights is when you can really push the boundaries on the red carpet. The bun is great, wonder how many cans of hairspray it took?

Model and co-host of Vogue Live, Ashley Graham, opted for all-black, which has been very common on red carpets lately. But this is no ordinary black tie, this is the corset work of the young designer Ludovic de Saint Cernin. Dark flowers with pointed fringes. Maybe Graham is a Ballard fan.

Chris Hemsworth, star of the upcoming Furiosa, is one of this year’s co-chairs — a strong move considering this is his Met Gala debut. He didn’t, strictly speaking, play it safe in that Tom Ford suit—even for celebrities, it’s never guaranteed that the cream won’t be spilled. But he certainly didn’t go all guns blazing in tailoring, which isn’t surprising. Before tonight, Vanity Fair asked him if he considered himself a modern person, to which he replied, “No. Do I think they made a mistake? Yes.” He has previously been known to wear flip-flops on the red carpet.

Chloe McDonnell

This will come as no surprise to anyone Anna Wintour It’s early. Remember the flowers for spring memes. Apologies to all the botanists out there, but I’m going to say they’re some kind of tulip? Last year, she made headlines for the rocky launch of her rumored relationship with Bill Nighy when the pair walked the carpet hand-in-hand. This year she is flying alone. Her velvet coat is from Loewe—remember, its creative director Jonathan Anderson is an honorary chair, so no big surprise. If you zoom in you will notice that the embroidery is amazing. The bean also wobbles. That’s a strong start.

Chloe McDonnell

The first big reveal of the night is the carpet that covers the Met’s famous steps. This year it’s not red, but a cream and green paint effect. Flowers would be too literal, but why not some lush real green grass? It’s a bit like someone leaving a green sock in a white wash.

Chloe McDonnell

Flowers for the Met? First sod. But alas it seems guaranteed.

But digging through the fashion archives can prove fruitful. Remember Moschino’s 2018 collection, where Gigi Hadid and Kaia Gerber dressed as real bouquets. fun! Or how about that final dress from the 2005 Chanel Haute Couture show featured in it handmade silk camellias. It would be amazing to see Challengers star Josh O’Connor, who is also Loewe’s menswear ambassador, in one of the brand’s fashion stores. pieces for growing grass. A casual nod to Wimbledon’s center court, each of the pop-up pieces is a collaboration between the Spanish fashion house and Spanish bio-designer Paula Ulargui Escalona. Game, set, match!

Time seems like another easy literal interpretation of the theme. Many celebrities already have lucrative contracts with high-end watch brands, so an excuse to wear a few watches will be hard to resist. This might also be the perfect time for someone to dig up Jeremy Scott’s grandfather clock dresses from his show in 2008. But if past threads there’s plenty to go on as you travel through this gallery by my colleague Nyima Jobe, we can expect a little more effort. Let’s see if anyone can top Billy Porter being carried down the steps of the Met by six shirtless men, Rihanna’s 55-pound ‘omelet dress’ or of course the outrage caused by Kim Kardashian in Marilyn Monroe’s 1962 JFK Dress.

Buckle up, it’s show time!

Chloe McDonnell

The guest list is being kept strictly confidential, which only fuels the rumors, although Rihanna broke that protocol revealing her appearance will be more “modest” than previous years. As co-chair, Jennifer Lopez is guaranteed an RSVP, while Zendaya will also take a spin on the stairs – for the first time since 2019. There is serious speculation that Taylor Swift will be there, but it’s unclear if her boyfriend, American soccer player Travis Kelce, will join her. If waiting for another #breaktheinternet moment.

Hi Ellie here, also from the Fashion desk, with a little more on this year’s theme. Although the Costume Institute’s show is titled “Sleeping Beauties: The Awakening of Fashion,” unlike in previous years the dress code for the gala deviates from the exhibition itself. Guests are told to pay homage to The Garden of Time, a title that takes its name from a 1962 short story by JG Ballard.

The dystopian work of a 20th-century science fiction writer might not seem like an obvious place to root a theme of The Met Galaand in fact, the deeper you dig, the weirder it seems like a choice.

As commentators noted in the run-up to this year’s event, Garden in Time was no tale of a bucolic utopia. Growing out of the volatile, satirical mind that also brought us the likes of Symphorophilia-inspired Crash and High-Rise, with an eye on crumbling high society, it tells the story of Count Axel and his Countess wife, who live in a villa surrounded by gardens. They have to keep an angry Goya-style mob at bay – an “approaching mob” – by plucking the flowers. Spoiler alert: no amount of flowers can keep the “advancing army” away.

Like fellow fashion writer Rosalind Jana indicated, there is a “delicious irony” here. “It’s a short story in which the last bastion of rich, sophisticated beauty—with its classical music, rare books, and fine clothes—is taken over by a working-class crowd.” An interesting choice for an event that might be called mild. the zenith of excess.

But there will no doubt be more than a few outfits that completely bypass this aspect of the inspiration text and land on floral motifs instead. While some might at least nod to darkness with riffs on weeds over roses and peonies.

Plus Ballard, who once described himself as “a man of complete and calm ordinariness”, knew the flower well – he worked for a time as a porter at the Covent Garden flower market. So maybe he was going to enjoy what are sure to be some spectacular floral-inspired outfits tonight? We can only speculate.

Chloe McDonnell

Hello and welcome to 2024 The Met Gala, fashion’s biggest and often wackiest night. It’s earned the nickname “The Oscars of the East Coast,” but the extravaganza’s wider cultural impact is such that, in the fashion world at least, its influence now supersedes the actual Oscars.

Led by Anna Wintoureditor-in-chief of Vogue and global chief content officer of Condé Nast, the party lasts about five hours—from posing on the red carpet to the dinner that no one actually eats.

It’s the ultimate amalgamation of today’s power players, spanning a roster of big names from fashion, film, sports, music, social media and, more recently, technology. If you’ve seen the 2016 documentary The First Monday in May, then you already know that every single guest is personally endorsed by Wintour. To achieve the right amalgam, she worked with a number of co-chairs, this year they are Zendaya, Jennifer Lopez, Chris Hemsworth and Bad Bunny.

Loewe creative director Jonathan Anderson is honorary chairman, as is Shou Zi Chew, CEO of TikTok, which is sponsoring the event – insiders say it’s gotten a little awkward as the US has since threatened to ban the app considering it a threat to national security under its current ownership. Wintour, as always, seems to be shaping it, choosing to ignore online criticism from US senators.

This isn’t the first time Wintour has tried to court the tech titans. In 2012, Amazon Fashion sponsored the event with Jeff Bezos posing next to Wintour in a Tom Ford tuxedo. Bezos is rumored to make another appearance this year, along with his wife Lauren Sanchez, who Wintour is reportedly “personally helping” refine her image. Watch this space.

Although the night always results in a series of viral memes, the main purpose is actually a fundraiser for the Fashion Wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York – it coincides with the opening of the Costume Institute’s annual show. Each of the 400 or so guest spots is paid for, usually by brand. This year, a ticket costs $75,000 (up $25,000) from last year, while tables start at $350,000. And remember, since Wintour endorses every guest, even if you’re part of the 1%, you can’t just buy yours way. Last year’s event raised approx 22 million dollarssetting a new record for the philanthropic event.