Feline fashion rules the 2023 Met Gala as Doja Cat and Jared Leto honor Lagerfeld | Meet Gala 2023

A The 6-foot feline and surprise appearance by Bill Nighy in his trademark dark suit beat out many supermodels in haute couture to be the belle of the ball at the Met Gala celebrating the late Karl Lagerfeld.

The tone of the red carpet ball-filled evening was set by host, Anna Wintour, who appeared to confirm long-standing romance rumors by making her entrance hand-in-hand with Nighy.

Serena Williams embraced the trend for dramatic celebrity pregnancy reveals, in a bump-hugging black dress wrapped in a string of pearls. Rapper Doja Cats’ tribute to Choupette, Lagerfeld’s beloved white Burmese cat, included a facial prosthetic that gave a feline deformity to her nose and upper lip, as well as glistening cat ears and a smooth train but was eclipsed by a giant Choupette who waved at the crowd like a Disney mascot and hugs an uninterested Lizzo, before the blue-eyed headpiece is removed to reveal Jared Leto in costume.

Lagerfeld, who famously denounced fashion retrospectives as boring. I don’t want to see all those old dresses she once told the New York Times would love for a night that embraces her genius to turn fashion into mass entertainment, and celebrates her beloved pet. is described as his heir, and to whom he is thought to have left 1.3m in token of his affection.

The show’s curators hope the red carpet will be a thoughtful tribute to a six-decade career in fashion, with industry insiders dueling over who can dig into the most obscure bits of the archives. Co-host Dua Lipa, in a corseted white Chanel dress worn on the catwalk in 1992 by Claudia Schiffer, model Lila Moss in a peach dress from one of the designer’s last collections for Fendi, and filmmaker Olivia Wilde, in an iconic violin dress from the collection The 1983 Lagerfeld for Chlo, which was also worn by front row favorite Chlo Sevigny, followed the assignment faithfully.

But so successful the party as a fundraiser with an estimated $50,000 ticket, it has been dubbed ATM for the Met that while the official dress code this year is dress in honor of Karl, the unspoken dress code of every Met Gala is dress. to make headlines.

This red carpet charts Lagerfeld’s pop culture legacy. Choupette’s cameo reflects how the designer, who turned his catwalks into casinos, airports and icebergs, brought surprise, humor and entertainment to the world of fashion.

The evening confirmed that Lagerfeld’s signature look remains iconic four years after his death, as seen in Cara Delevingne’s powdered silver wig and James McAvoy’s black paper fan, and most immersive in this full-length tribute to Oscar winner Ke Huy Quan, created in collaboration with designer Dior. . Kim Jones, who channeled Lagerfeld down to fingerless gloves, sunglasses and diamond tie pins.

Lagerfeld’s career included long and successful tenures at Fendi, Chlo and their eponymous labels, as well as early stints at Jean Patou.

But the evening underscored the fact that it was Chanel’s home with which she had a lasting symbiotic relationship. Camellias, pearls and tweed, Chanel prints, appear countless times.

Anne Hathaway’s strapless white tweed dress with matching jacket made for her by Versace was a red carpet gown in a classic Chanel tweed suit. Cardi B’s dress, by designer Chen Peng, had camellias encrusted all over the quilted fabric in the style of a Chanel 2.55 handbag, while Sean Diddy Combs designed his own dress, which featured 1,000 silk and velvet camellias.

Kim Kardashian, who dominated headlines at the previous Met Gala by going on a strict diet to wear a dress worn by Marilyn Monroe, had a sober year by comparison, in a skin-toned Schiaparelli corset strategically draped in 50,000 freshwater pearls.