Looks We Are Dying To See At The Met Gala In 2024
It is that time of year when a statement is published and designers start composing an unforgettable look. Spending days and nights designing a one-of-a-kind look that will be worn for a few hours but, immortalized forever. I’m obviously referring to the reveal of the 2024 Met Gala theme;“Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion”. It is not literally about sleeping beauties, like Princess Aurora, it is about celebrating garments that are too delicate to be worn again. The garments are shaped around three main elements; land, sea, and sky. When we heard of this theme, we instantly thought of brands; Iris Van Herpen, Alexander McQueen, vintage Balmain, vintage Givenchy, and Guo Pei.
The Oyster Dress by Alexander McQueen
Photo via Getty Images
The Oyster dress is a part of the spring/summer 2003 Alexander McQueen Irere collection. This collection depicts a disaster at sea and this dress represents the evolution of McQueen’s craft. The designer believes during his time at Givenchy he learned softness, lightness, and received the gift of draping. When designing this dress, McQueen envisioned a shipwreck and there was a strong emotion in the atmosphere that felt chaotic. McQueen’s successor, Sarah Burton stated, “He wanted this idea of it—was almost like she drowned.” The fine boning, tulle bottom, and frayed chiffon top created this beautifully structured but disheveled dress. Only two of these dresses exist in the world; one sits at the Savage Beauty exhibition at the Met Museum and the other sits in the closet of Kim Kardashian. The backstory and details of the Oyster dress perfectly captures the sea element of the Met Gala theme.
The Water Dress by Iris Van Harper
Photo via Vogue
The water dress by Iris Van Herpen’s Spring Ready-to-Wear 2011 showed the world that science can meet technology. The designer was inspired by the Amsterdam Centre for Architecture (ARCAM) exhibition of architects and designers to make a dress that had a water splash look. She accomplished this challenge by creating a short nude dress with gathered fabric detailing and nude strings draping from the top of the dress to the bottom. The dress almost blended in with model, Tanya Dziahileva’s complexion and created an odd SPFX look on her body. Herpen challenged herself even further by making a dress accessory out of clear acrylic that wrapped around the dress. It created this look that made it look like water was splashing out from the model herself. The acrylic on this dress makes it far too delicate to be worn again and it shows designer, Iris Van Herpen’s tenacity and growth as a designer. This dress also plays into the sea element, which makes it better!
The ball gowns from the Givenchy Spring 1996 Couture collection by John Galliano
Photo via SHOWstudio
Even though the Met Gala theme has been thoroughly explained, there are celebrities who love taking the Met Gala themes literally. The ball gowns from the Givenchy Spring 1996 collection would be perfect to wear to the Met Gala as a sleeping beauty because the collection was inspired by the classic fairytale, Princess and the Pea. It is about a prince in search of marrying a real princess. When a woman comes to his door claiming that she is a real princess, the prince's mother tests her by placing a pea under a huge stack of mattresses and then asking the woman to sleep on the mattresses. The ball gowns illustrate this story with its silk material and voluminous petticoat that resemble a fluffy silk pillow or mattress. The corsets in the gowns add an 1800s princess feel to the look. The stack of mattresses makes the telling of this story even more accurate. These gowns tell the story of a beautiful princess who was trying to get her rest but could not because a pea was under the stack of mattresses, which makes these gowns perfect for a sleeping beauty look at the Met Gala!
Guo Pei Spring 2018 Couture
Photo via Harpar’s BAZAAR
The Chinese fashion designer, Guo Pei, is known for her fascinating imagination and her extraordinary couture pieces. For her Spring 2018 Couture collection, the theme of this collection was life and she outdid herself with the golden dress. The dress had flowers blossoming at the bottom and waistline and flowers sprouting from the neckline. With the theme being life, the top of the dress represents the early stage of life and the bottom is the middle stage of life. What makes this dress even more unique is its material, which is made out of woven bamboo from Huangshan in Anhui, China. The designer worked with craftsmen with over 30 years of experience to create the piece. The backstory of this material and Guo Pei’s thought process behind this dress makes it perfect for the Met and it would represent land.
Vintage Dress Balmain by Oscar De La Renta
This spring/summer 2001 Balmain dress by Oscar de la Renta currently sits at the Met Museum and it is absolutely stunning. This gown was inspired by Balmain’s peak era, which was during the late 50s and early 60s. Renta gave this sleeveless, silk gown a scoop neckline and bedazzled this dress with clear glass beads. For the skirt of the dress, fluffy white feathers were added to resemble the ostrich feathered Balmain dress. Even though this dress was a remake of the Ostrich feathered dress it could be interesting to see how the current creative director of balmain, Olivier Rousteing could rework this dress.
We are so excited to see how stylists interpret the “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion” theme and how they style celebrities. It will also be fun to see how fashion designers recreate fragile and rare fashion pieces.
