Met Gala fashion faux pas – from Kardashians in cardigans to soggy T-shirts

The Met Gala, fashion’s biggest night of the year, has just taken place – a moment of frenzied anticipation as behind-the-scenes negotiations regarding which designer will have the honour of dressing which celebrity finally come to fruition (each pairing and outfits having been given the hallowed Anna Wintour seal of approval) and the watching public gets to decide who aced and who flunked the dress code.

2024’s theme felt loose, to say the least. A spin-off from the big costume exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum in New York, which this year explores the theme “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion” (comprised of pieces spanning four centuries and in various states of repair from the museum’s archives), celebrities were challenged to dress to a “Garden of Time” dress code for Monday evening’s gala, a title inspired by a JG Ballard short story of the same name.

With an unusual amount of freedom to play with, the resulting choices felt more disjointed than ever before.

Let’s examine the most noteworthy looks:

Kim Kardashian in a cardigan – with a controversial tiny waist

Kim Kardashian wore a strapless silver Maison Margiela gown with a waist so impossibly tiny it recalled the genuine Marilyn Monroe dress she wore to the same event in 2022. That design was so minuscule that she had to adopt an extreme diet and exercise regime to fit into it.

Inevitably the social media consternation soon mounted. “Where did you put all your internal organs?” asked one commenter on Instagram. Certainly, it’s concerning to see such influential figures promoting unachievable body standards but this much we have come to expect from La Kardashian.

What we never anticipated was that she might become a cardigan influencer too. “It’s the wildest night of my life in a garden and I just ran out and threw on my boyfriend’s sweater… my hair’s all messed up,” she explained of her ensemble, which was finished with what could only be described as a bolero or shrug cardigan, that Noughties occasion wear staple we all thought had been consigned to fashion history. Perhaps not?

Lauren Sánchez joins the fashion establishment

She’s the woman putting “filthy rich” fashion on the map as the fiancée of Amazon founder and the world’s third richest man, Jeff Bezos, but Lauren Sánchez tried “something different” for her first Met Gala having reportedly been wooed and closely monitored by Wintour in the lead up to the event.

Usually preferring a low-cut, sexy aesthetic, Sánchez put her trust into Fernando Garcia and Laura Kim, co-creative directors of Oscar de la Renta, for her gown, leaning into the label’s refined and upscale design codes.

The black bustier with a shattered-mirror glass skirt was designed to reflect “a metaphor for life”. “It’s a little bit about all your broken pieces in life and putting those pieces back together,” Sánchez said, adding that Bezos would be her best accessory on the night.

John Galliano’s clandestine retrospective

It had allegedly been planned that this year’s exhibition would focus on the work of John Galliano, the one time Givenchy and Dior designer who fell from grace following anti-semitic rants in 2010 and remains on the fringes of the industry working at avant-garde label Maison Margiela.

But those plans were said to have been shelved in favour of a less controversial theme. This didn’t stop Wintour (one of Galliano’s greatest cheerleaders who is said to be vying for him to return to a major fashion house) engineering numerous red carpet homages to her great friend, among them Zendaya taking to the red carpet in two Galliano-designed looks, one a Margiela bespoke gown and the other a Givenchy Spring-Summer 1996 creation from Galliano’s time at the house. Gwendoline Christie also paraded the red carpet in a look created by the designer for Margiela.

Notably, Galliano himself did not appear on the red carpet but he did pose with Kardashian briefly.

The no-shows: from Rihanna to Blake Lively

From Rihanna in a trailing Chinese coat which gained instant meme status to Beyoncé in sheer crystals and Katy Perry as a candelabra, the world’s biggest musical divas have provided some of the biggest Met Gala-fuelled water cooler moments.

With Taylor Swift, Rihanna, Blake Lively, Beyoncé and Perry all in absentia (in spite of faked images of Perry sparking early excitement), anyone in search of an iconic moment had to make do with Doja Cat leaving her hotel in a towel and arriving on the red carpet in an oversized wet t-shirt or Tyla being carried up the museum stairs in her Balmain dress, which isn’t quite the same.

Florals, groundbreaking?

Wintour has never, that we know, uttered the words: “Florals? For spring? Groundbreaking.” That was Miranda Priestly, the editrix said to be based on her in the book and film The Devil Wears Prada. And yet they feel ever-associated with her reputation for withering put-downs and exacting standards.

This year’s theme choice may have been a playful nod to the association or a terrifying challenge to designers to do something genuinely groundbreaking with old-as-time florals. Wintour herself stepped up to the plate (or should I say flower bed?) in a coat adorned with floral motifs by Loewe, Sarah Jessica Parker chose Richard Quinn’s crystal and lace flower patterns, Demi Moore looked spectacular in Harris Reed’s overblown print and Ayo Edebiri wore a gown with a delightful meadow of blooms on the skirt.

Groundbreaking? Maybe not, but a reminder of the simple, timeless joy of a floral.