Met Gala celebrates Black Dandyism in style

The brightest stars in Hollywood, music, sports, and fashion hit the red carpet Monday for the Met Gala. This year's extravagant Manhattan fundraiser spotlights the subversive style of Black dandyism.

The blockbuster night's theme explores the sharply tailored dandy aesthetic and its rich, complicated history. It also celebrates the opening of a corresponding exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute.

But for the fashionistas, the Met Gala -- always the first Monday in May -- is simply one of the world's top red carpets with blinding star power.

Oscar-nominated actor Colman Domingo and Formula One driver Lewis Hamilton, two of the co-chairs of fashion's marquee event, were among the early arrivals alongside gala supremo Anna Wintour, the editor-in-chief of Vogue.

Domingo paid tribute to the late Andre Leon Talley, Vogue's first Black creative director and one of fashion's towering figures, in a royal blue Valentino cape with a glittering white collar over a snazzy black and gold jacket and gray tweed trousers.

Hamilton, meanwhile, was wowed in a sharp cream suit and matching backwards cap, diamonds glittering in his ears, lapels, cuffs, and hands.

US actress Taraji P. Henson arrives in New York for the 2025 Met Gala at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on May 5, 2025. The Gala raises money for the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute. The 2025 Met Gala is themed "Tailored for You," aligning with the Costume Institute’s exhibition, "Superfine: Tailoring Black Style," set to open to the public on May 10.Photo by ANGELA WEISS / AFP

Another co-chair, musician and designer Pharrell Williams, looked snappy in a short, pearl-encrusted white jacket and flared black tuxedo trousers.

Tailored suits, bejeweled brooches, canes, and jaunty hats were de rigueur for the men.

Among the women in attendance, actress Teyana Taylor definitely understood the assignment. She arrived in a black suit with red pinstripes and a matching huge red coat, the back fully pleated and "Harlem Rose" embossed in the fabric.

Rapper Doechii wore a logo-heavy Louis Vuitton cream shorts suit with burgundy accents, a cigar dangling between her lips.

And actress Zendaya, always a massive hit at the gala, stunned in a slim white suit and dramatic brimmed hat -- perhaps some bridal chic now that she is engaged to Tom Holland?

The last to arrive at the party was Rihanna, who cradled her new baby bump in an all-black ensemble after revealing she was pregnant as the event began.

Her partner A$AP Rocky, a gala co-chair, confirmed the pregnancy on the carpet: "I'm glad everybody's happy for us because we're happy."

TOPSHOT - US singer-songwriter Madonna arrives in New York for the 2025 Met Gala at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on May 5, 2025. The Gala raises money for the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute. The 2025 Met Gala is themed "Tailored for You," aligning with the Costume Institute’s exhibition, "Superfine: Tailoring Black Style," set to open to the public on May 10. (Photo by Angela WEISS / AFP)

'New sense of importance'

The gala comes five years after the enormous anti-racist uprising of the Black Lives Matter movement, which pushed several cultural institutions in the United States to grapple with their representation of race and diversity.

This Met theme has been years in the making, but now coincides with Donald Trump's recent efforts to quash institutional initiatives to promote diversity—a push to keep culture and history defined on the Republican president's terms.

The Met Gala and its exhibit, "Superfine: Tailoring Black Style," promises a sharp contrast to that notion, a deep dive into Black dandyism from the 18th century to today.

"This exhibition was planned many years ago, and we didn't know what would be happening in the political arena, but it's taken on a new sense of importance and purpose," Wintour told AFP.

Indian actress Priyanka Chopra Jonas (R) and husband, US singer-songwriter and actor Nick Jonas, arrive for the 2025 Met Gala at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on May 5, 2025, in New York. The Gala raises money for the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute. The 2025 Met Gala is themed "Tailored for You," aligning with the Costume Institute’s exhibition, "Superfine: Tailoring Black Style," set to open to the public on May 10. Photo by ANGELA WEISS / AFP

Subversion

The Met was inspired by the book "Slaves to Fashion: Black Dandyism and the Styling of Black Diasporic Identity," written by guest curator and Barnard professor Monica Miller.

Her book details how dandyism was a style imposed on Black men in 18th-century Europe, when well-dressed "dandified" servants became a trend.

But Black men throughout history have subverted the concept as a means of cultivating power, transforming aesthetics and elegance into a means of establishing identity and social mobility.

During the vibrant Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s and 1930s, men wore sharp suits and polished shoes as a show of defiance in racially segregated America.

"Superfine" is a rare Costume Institute exhibition to spotlight men and male fashion, and the first to focus on Black designers and artists.

The Met Gala was first organized in 1948 and, for decades, was reserved for New York's high society—until Wintour transformed the party into a high-profile catwalk for the rich and famous in the 1990s.

It remains a fundraiser for the Costume Institute. The famed Manhattan museum said Monday it expected to rake in $31 million this year.