The first Monday of May tends to be one of the most significant and annual historic fashion events of the year. From womenswear to menswear, It can only be the Met Gala.
Held in New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art, this soirée was established in 1948 as a fundraiser for the Costume Institute. The very first Gala was a midnight dinner and tickets were only $50 each. However, in 1973 the Met Gala was met with significant changes when editor-in-chief Diana Vreeland become a consultant for the Costume Institute, thus introducing annual themes for the balls. Today, the Met Gala is a luxurious, blockbuster event and considered "the jewel in New York City's social crown."
The Gala is regarded to be the most exclusive and renowned event in the world, and one of the biggest fundraising nights in New York City. Since Anna Wintour become the new Vogue editor-in-chief and chairman of the event in 1995, the Gala has broken records year after year such as $9 Million raised in 2013 to a record-breaking $12 Million in 2014. The Gala then looked to surpass a predicted $200 Million USD after 2019. Individual tickets now cost $40,000 for those outside the official guest list to achieve the utmost exclusivity.
Unfortunately in 2020 due to concerns of the worldwide pandemic Covid-19, the Met Gala this year has been indefinitely pushed back. And as much as we fashionistas are saddened that we won't get to scrutinise a plethora of celebrities and their versions of this year's theme, we also won't be able to see designers showcase their latest creations either. So instead, I have curated a list of the best Met Gala designers who have created jaw-droppingly fabulous looks from A all the way to Z.
Let's get into it.
Alexander McQueen
The four-time winner of 'British Designer of the Year' has produced gorgeous looks on celebrities such as Naomi Campbell, Nicole Kidman and Florence Welch. The Alexander McQueen fashion house is now run by creative director Sarah Burton since the designers passing in 2010 and has designed gowns for royalty such as Kate Middleton who wore a McQueen wedding dress.
Burberry
Established in 1856 by Thomas Burberry, this brand originally focused on developing outdoor attire. The brand has since moved into the high fashion market, retaining the iconic Burberry check pattern that is recognisable by almost anyone. Pictured here is Ezra Miller in a pinstripe suit and diamond corset for the theme 'Camp' attempting to merge and bend ideas of gender.
Balmain
Natasha Poly wears a Balmain number, a french brand that has had 10 different creative directors since the death of founder Pierre Balmain in 1982. With Olivier Rousteing being a relatively unknown designer but now holding onto the reigns as creative director, he has brought a fresh take on the brand's aesthetic that remains to this day. He has also been credited with adding an Asian influence to the clothing, as Asia comprises a huge part of the brand's buyers.
Balenciaga (This designer was the first theme in 1973, 'The World of Balenciaga')
Spanish fashion house Balenciaga has a reputation as a couturier of strong standards and was referred to as "the master of us all" by Christian Dior. Lady Gaga lets us remember founder Cristóbal Balenciaga by being the brand is known to create avant-garde pieces. They have always gone against the rules, guidelines and bourgeoisie status of the governing body of the French industry (Chambre syndicale de la haute couture parisienne).
Bob Mackie
Cher's favourite designer. Award-winning American Bob Mackie has dressed a number of celebrities since designing costumes as far back as the 1960s on broadway. Referred to as "the sultan of sequins" or "the rajah of rhinestones" Bob Mackie has said, "A woman who wears my clothes is not afraid to be noticed."
Chanel
Founded in 1909, fashion house Chanel adopted simple-line designs that were opposite of the hourglass-figure that was achieved by the fashions of the late 19th century. Chanel has been known to use colours that were traditionally associated with masculinity in Europe such as navy blue or grey to denote feminine boldness of character. Mary-Kate Olsen, Ashley Olsen and Lily-Rose Depp are featured here wearing classic Chanel that accentuate the timeless designs, such as gold buttons and chains.
Carolina Herrera
After working for designer Emilio Pucci in 1965, she has not only worked her way from appearing on the International Best Dressed List in 1972 but was then elected to its Hall of Fame in 1980. Diana Vreeland, Vogue's editor-in-chief at the time suggested she design a clothing line. A few of her most notable clients have included Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, who asked her to design the dress for her daughter Caroline's wedding.
Alicia Keys wears a mint green, hooded, sequin tulle gown inspired by Grace Jones.
Comme Des Garçons
Japanese fashion label Comme Des Garçons (like the boys) has developed a market-based department store concept that stocks its main collections and features their other brands such as Shirt and Play. Rihanna wears an interesting and eccentric dress that is supposed to combat masculinity and femininity in one.
Christian Siriano
Siriano first gained attention after winning the fourth season of American design television show Project Runway.
After being rejected by the Fashion Institute of Technology, Siriano decided to study abroad at the American InterContinental University in London, England. He then interned at Vivienne Westwood and later at Alexander McQueen which is his favourite designer. He moved to New York after graduating. He celebrated the 10th anniversary of his fashion line in February 2018 with a runway show of his Fall 2018 collection. The New York City show featured a diverse set of models, including Ashley Graham, Selma Blair and Danielle Brooks. This interesting look was worn by Michael Urie that merged two looks together for the theme 'camp'.
Calvin Klein
Established in 1968, CK is one of the most well-known brands in the world. It specialises in leather, lifestyle accessories, home furnishings, perfumery, jewellery, watches and ready-to-wear. Starting as a coat shop in New York City, the brand has moved from nearly facing bankruptcy to becoming a billion-dollar company.
Dior
This French fashion house was founded in 1946 by designer Christian Dior. It currently designs and retails leather goods, fashion accessories, footwear, jewellery, timepieces, fragrance, makeup, and skincare products, but also maintains its tradition as a creator of Haute-couture under the Christian Dior Couture division.
Dior has created solid partnerships with Hollywood celebrities and social media influencers, working closely with these individuals to reach a wider range of demographics and re-establish its identity as a new, modern brand, despite the fact that it has been around for a while.
David Laport
Laport has kickstarted his career by creating a modern brand aesthetic which is to contemporise the female form. The cut and fit of a garment is supposed to take centre stage, like this canary yellow piece Solange wears. Specialising in women's wear, Laport takes inspiration from experimental female silhouettes which are sculptural in shape but light and prone to movement. A bright colour palette keeps this image fresh.
Dundas
Peter Dundas is a Norwegian designer who was appointed creative director at Roberto Cavalli. He studied in New York, moved to Paris and became an assistant to Jean-Paul Gautier in 1992 for 10 years, then moved to Christian Lacroix for two years, turned into an artistic director for Pucci and finally arriving at Cavalli. Dundas had developed Pucci's brand history of glamorous, colourful and patterned collections that focused on nightlife as a key inspiration. Art of Elysium named Dundas the recipient of its Visionary Award for 2020, with the designer creating the decorations for its annual gala on the theme of "Heaven".
Donna Karan
Nicknamed The Queen Of Seventh Avenue, Donna Karan is an American fashion designer and the creator of the Donna Karan New York and DKNY clothing labels. The Council of Fashion Designers of America named her Menswear Designer of the Year 1992 and Womenswear Designer of the Year 1990 and 1996. She was a nominee for the latter again in 2003 and was presented with the Lifetime Achievement Award by the CFDA in 2004. She won special CFDA awards in 1985, 1986 and 1987.
Dolce & Gabbana
Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana met in Milan in 1980 and designed for the same fashion house. In 1982, they established a designer consulting studio; in time it grew to become "Dolce & Gabbana". They presented their first women's collection in 1985 in Milan, where a year later their store would open its doors.
Having been inspired by the eclectic thrift shop and bohemian styles, Dolce & Gabbana features deeply coloured designs and animal prints. They have been described as "Haute hippy dom" and take inspiration in Italian film history. Domenico says: "When we design it's like a movie. We think of a story and we design the clothes to go with it."
They say that they are more concerned about creating the best and most flattering clothes rather than sparking trends. They once also said that they wouldn't mind if their only contribution to fashion history was a black bra. But Sicily and Sicilian culture is what is most important to the style and identity of Dolce & Gabbana.
Erdem
Known for his use of experimental textiles, vibrant prints, and detailed craftsmanship, Erdem Moralioglu mixes the delicate with the bold. After interning with Vivienne Westwood, ERDEM has received around 11 awards over the years such as from the British Fashion Council and most recently the 2015 British Fashion Council’s Establishment Designer award. He was also nominated by the British Fashion Council for "Designer of the Year 2009" and was named one of the 1000 most influential people in London by the Evening Standard.
Ferragamo
Salvatore Ferragamo first opened the Hollywood Boot Shop in 1923 in California after emigrating from Italy. After returning home, he set up a shoe shop in Florence in 1927. The current shoemaking company regards 1928 as the date of its foundation, however, and it therefore celebrated its 80th anniversary in 2008. After Salvatore's death, the company has continued to display innovative designs and use of materials. Such ingenuity goes back to Salvatore's time in California, when he studied anatomy to make shoes which were more comfortable. Notable innovations include the wedge heel, the shell-shaped sole, the ‘invisible’ sandal, metal heels and soles, the 18-carat gold sandal, the sock-shoe, sculpture heels, and the gloved arch shoe created for the Maharani of Cooch Behar in 1938.
Gucci
Gucci was founded by Guccio Gucci in Florence, Tuscany, in 1921. It has been ranked in the Forbes "World's Most Valuable Brands" list and also the 38th most valuable brand in the world. Gucci is also the highest-selling Italian brand. Gucci's distinctive lines made its products among the most frequently copied in the world in the early 2000s. Pigskin, calf, and imported exotic animal skins were subjected to various methods of fabrication. A particularly iconic touch, introduced in 1964, was the use of the double-G logo for belt buckles and other accessory decorations
Giambattista Valli
An Italian fashion designer whose designs both ready to wear and Haute couture were presented semi-annually during Paris Fashion Week. His designs are one that is a leading and established in the worldwide fashion scene that brings a new approach and meaning to luxury and beauty that attracts a universe of young, modern and international generation. Aiming to be worn by the highly glamorous and sophisticated women from around the globe, Valli has been praised by celebrities and fashion lovers alike, earning him a Star Honoree Award from Fashion Group International in 2011 in New York and Best Designer of the Year Awards from Elle China in 2013 and from Marie Claire Spain in 2015.
Givenchy
The house of Givenchy was founded in 1952 by designer Hubert de Givenchy but after his retirement in 1995 it has been seen by a handful of different directors. Most recently its artistic director was Clare Waight Keller, the first woman to hold that position. In 1954, Hubert de Givenchy presented the first shirt dress (which later evolved into the sack dress in 1957 and he was the first high fashion designer to create a luxury ready-to-wear clothing line, called "Givenchy Université", which was produced in Paris using machinery imported from the United States.
Guo Pei Couture
Guo Pei is a Chinese fashion designer. She is best known for designing dresses for Chinese celebrities, and in America for Rihanna's trailing yellow gown at the 2015 Met Ball. In an interview with Forbes Magazine, she recalls her father having thrown away her sketches and paintings as a child. In the same interview, Guo says she got her start in sewing at the age of 2 years old, helping her mother make clothes for the winter and developed her love for dressmaking. Her first collection to be showcased as a part of Paris Fashion Week was her Spring Summer 2016 collection. Inspired by Spring flowers for femininity and the phoenix for peace and purity, the collection had traditional Chinese influences like gold tassels, intricate threadwork embroidery over silk, bibs and long trains.
Giles Deacon
Giles Deacon is an English fashion designer, Creative Director and founder of Giles Deacon group, Couture Fashion House. Deacon was employed by the fashion houses Bottega Veneta and Gucci, before founding his own label, GILES, in 2003. He launched his first collection for GILES at the 2004 London Fashion Week and was named "Best New Designer" at the British Fashion Awards. Deacon's designs have been met with critical acclaim and have sparked a renewed interest in London fashion. Deacon has been known to challenge the traditional ideas of womenswear and often uses wild prints and pop culture references in his designs.
Halston
Roy Halson Frowick's designs are usually minimalist, clean and often made of cashmere or Ultrasuede. They were a new phenomenon in the mid-1970s discotheques and redefined American fashion. Halston was known for creating a relaxed urban lifestyle for American women. His fame rose when he designed the pillbox hat Jacqueline Kennedy wore to the inauguration of her husband, President John F. Kennedy, in 1961. In the late 1960s, Halston made the transition to women's clothing, opening a boutique on Madison Avenue in New York and started a ready-to-wear line.
Iris Van Herpen
Fashion designer Iris van Herpen is internationally recognised as one of fashion’s most talented and forward-thinking creators who continuously pushes the boundaries of fashion design. Since her first show in 2007, van Herpen has been preoccupied with developing new forms and methods of sartorial expression by combining the most traditional and the most radical materials and garment construction methods into her unique aesthetic vision. Today, van Herpen continues to work within her Amsterdam studio, where new ideas are born, and where Haute Couture orders are meticulously crafted for her global clientele, each creation passing through the designer’s own hands.
JW Anderson
Jonathan Anderson founded fashion label JW Anderson in 2008 and lived in Northern Ireland during his youth. The brand mostly focuses on menswear but started focusing on womenswear in 2010. From 2012 onwards, the brand and its designer have collaborated with a number of retail fashion brands, most notably Topshop and Versace. In September 2016, JW Anderson announced their first exhibition Disobedient Bodies from March to June in 2017. The show was aimed to create a discussion on the theme of the human body and more specifically how each body part can disobey. More than 100 works were presented including Issey Miyake and Yves Saint Laurent.
Jean Paul Gaultier
In 1982, Gaultier founded his eponymous fashion label and from 2003 to 2010 he served as the creative director at French luxury house Hermès for womenswear. When he was younger he began to send sketches to famous couture stylists at an early age instead of seeking formal training as a designer. French-Italian designer Pierre Cardin was impressed by his talent and hired him as an assistant in 1970. Gaultier was the creative director of Hermès from 2003 to 2010 and is most well known for the 2003–04 exhibit in the Costume Institute of New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art entitled "Braveheart: Men in Skirts," which showed designs by Dries van Noten, Vivienne Westwood, and Rudi Gernreich which was for"designers and individuals who have appropriated the skirt as a means of injecting novelty into male fashion, as a means of transgressing moral and social codes, and as a means of redefining an ideal masculinity."
Karl Lagerfeld
Anna Wintour herself wearing a Karl Lagerfeld outfit, whom she was a friend of till his passing in 2019. He was known as the creative director of the French fashion house Chanel, a position held from 1983 until his death, was also the creative director of the Italian fur and leather goods fashion house Fendi and of his own fashion label. He collaborated on a variety of fashion and art-related projects. Lagerfeld first came into the fashion world when he entered a coat design competition sponsored by the International Wool Secretariat. He won the coat category and befriended Yves Saint Laurent, who won the dress category, and was soon after hired by Pierre Balmain. He worked as Balmain's assistant, and later apprentice, for three years, thus beginning his career.
Louis Vuitton
Louis Vuitton Malletier, commonly referred to as Louis Vuitton is a French fashion house and luxury retail company founded in 1854. For six consecutive years (2006–2012), Louis Vuitton has been named the world's most valuable luxury brand. LV originally started as a brand for luggage to create light and practical ways of storage. In 1901, the Louis Vuitton Company introduced the 'Steamer Bag', a smaller piece of luggage designed to be kept inside Vuitton luggage trunks and went on to creating the 'speedy bag' thus starting the development for leather goods, and eventually fashion. On 26 March 2018, Virgil Abloh (pictured) was named artistic director of men's wear, replacing Kim Jones who had departed for Dior. He is the label's first African-American artistic director and one of few black designers of a major European fashion house. His debut show was held at the 2018 Paris Men's Fashion Week and staged in the historical Palais-Royal gardens' courtyard.
Lanvin
Founded by Jeanne Lanvin, this brand was established in 1889 and is the third oldest French fashion house. Lanvin first made clothes for her daughter, Marie-Blanche de Polignac, which began to attract the attention of a number of wealthy people, who requested copies for their own children. Soon, Lanvin was making dresses for their mothers and some of the most famous names in Europe. The Lanvin logo shows a mother and daughter wearing gowns that were inspired by a photograph taken for Jeanne Lanvin as she attended a ball with her daughter wearing matching outfits in 1907.
Miu Miu
Italian high-fashion brand Miu Miu is a sister-brand and fully owned by Prada and was established in 1993. They opened their first independent store in China in 2009 and in 2011, Miu Miu launched the Women's Tales series. The campaign consisted of short films that were produced in conjunction with high-profile female directors. The outcome was a list of short, silent films that featured Miu Miu's collections and was shown at the 69th Venice International Film Festival.
Marchesa
Marchesa is named after socialite Marchesa Luisa Casati and is an American brand based in New York City. The brand was founded by Georgina Chapman and Keren Craig as Chapman first started working as a costume designer and Craig working in textiles and embroidery. Marchesa proves to be a red carpet favourite as many Hollywood actresses choose this particular designer to be pictured in.
