Dandies for the Ages: How Met Gala Guests Took on Fashion History

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“Superfine: Tailoring Black Style” charts three centuries of dress. The Met Gala blue carpet was like a fashion history lesson, with playwright Jeremy O. Harris representing the 18th-century (the era in which the exhibition begins) to designer Andre Walker working the clean-lined ease of today.

Rihanna, with a new baby bump, modeled some Belle Epoque curves, as did Jodie Turner-Smith whose Burberry ensemble paid homage to Selika Lazevski, a black equestrian who lived in Paris. The Harlem Renaissance inspired Jazz Age references, such as fka Twigs’s Wales Bonner dress, while the ’30s more broadly were an inspiration for Madonna who reprised her role as a latter-day Marlene Dietrich. The most deeply referenced decades were the ’40s (tip your hat to Teyana Taylor and Doja Cat) and the ’70s, when men’s wardrobes became more expressive and individualistic, as represented by Leon Bridges’s Nicholas Daley flares and many open collars. Pinstripes and tailoring go hand-in-hand, and there were some subversive takes on corp-core. As a whole, the red carpet was a demonstration of power dressing.