Creative Genius Karl Lagerfeld Beyond Fashion at the Met

The first Monday in May is fast approaching, marking the return of the annual Met Galaand with it, an internet frenzy surrounding the red carpet Galas’ fun choreography and, of course, the guests’ over-the-top outfits.

Attended by A-listers across the industry, this annual gala raises funds for the Metropolitan Museum of Arts Costume Institute, while celebrating the opening of its annual exhibition. This year’s show, Karl Lagerfeld: A Line of Beauty, will pay tribute to the late Karl Lagerfeld, whose seven-decade career as a creative polymath spanned fashion, photography, film, acting, curating, furniture design, publishing and more.

Featuring more than 150 garments from Lagerfeld’s career including designs for Balmain, Patou, Chlo, Fendi, Chanel, and her eponymous label, Karl Lagerfeld, the show will explore the aesthetic themes that permeated Lagerfeld’s work from the 1950s through to her final collection in 2019.

Lagerfeld is notorious for disliking fashion retrospectives, stating in 2015 New York Time: I don’t want to see all those old dresses. Paying homage to Lagerfeld’s views, the exhibition pairs clothing with references from Lagerfeld’s extensive catalog of sketches and influences across disciplines from Art Deco to the Memphis Group, and Renaissance-era clothing to robots.

German-born Lagerfeld spent his teenage years in Paris studying drawing and history at the Lyce Montaigne, pursuing aspirations of becoming a commercial illustrator. At the age of 16, Lagerfeld’s path veered him into the fashion industry when he entered and won first place prizes in an international design competition. His winning sketch of a belted boatneck coat opened the door for Lagerfeld to become an assistant to Pierre Balmain in 1954. Working from assistant to apprentice to creative director, Lagerfeld spent time at the studios of Patou, Chlo, and Fendi before finally landing at Chanel in 1983, in where he remained creative director until his death in 2019.

Through it all, sketching has remained a core part of Lagerfeld’s highly collaborative creative process, serving as the primary mode of communication between himself and the team of prime ministers, or chief tailors, charged with bringing his visions to life.

Impressionistic yet detailed sketches are precise, almost mathematical, according to exhibition curator Andrew Bolton. The premise is knowing to the millimeter what every line means, he says. Lagerfeld uses unusual mediums in her sketches, including Tipp-Ex and eyeshadow, allowing the designer to better communicate texture and shine.

Outside of his prolific fashion career, Lagerfeld is also a filmmaker, directing and producing several short films, most notably 18-minute shorts. Once Upon a time, starring Keira Knightley as Gabrielle Coco Chanel. An accomplished photographer, Lagerfeld shot marketing and editorial campaigns for Chanel and Fendi, while also maintaining the practice of portrait photography and personal still life photography, which were the subject of more than a dozen gallery exhibitions during his lifetime. In front of the camera, he also appeared in that 1973 film Love by Andy Warhol, plays the German aristocrat.

In one of his latest art world collaborations, Lagerfeld teamed up with architect Aline Asmar d’Amman to produce a line of furniture for design gallery Carpenters Workshop in 2019. Built in black-and-white marble, the collection references classical Greek architecture, with proportions derived from the golden ratio, while evoking minimalism and brutalism.

Guests attending the Met Gala have been instructed to dress in Karl’s honor, and with the designer’s in-depth creative catalog to draw inspiration from, it’s safe to say we can expect a lot more than tweed and pearls on the red carpet.