Couture Culture: 2024 Met Gala review

Once upon a time, in the dystopian and post-apocalyptic world fashioned by J.G. Ballard in 1962, there lived a Count and Countess. The Count and Countess enjoyed a decadent life in the lap of luxury, with rare books and rare paintings filling their Palladian villa, with the villa itself situated within an extensive and exquisite estate. Forming part of the estate, was a garden. This garden was filled with unusual blooms, with the most peculiar being the crystal time flowers.

One day an angry mob appeared on the horizon, advancing towards the villa, and threatening the opulence the couple had grown used to. In an attempt to protect themselves, the couple turned to their garden, plucking the crystal time flowers, and freezing the mob in their tracks.  But, soon enough, the last flower was plucked, sealing the couples’ miserable fate at the hands of the unrelenting angry mob.

The Garden of Time is a haunting short story, allegorical in nature and applicable in society. It is also a source of artistic inspiration, as it was for designer Thom Browne’s 2021 fashion collection, and, more significantly, the dress code for the 2024 Met Gala.

While the Costume Institute’s exhibit, ‘Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion,’ was about breathing new life into fragile and historic garments, the dress code, with its dystopian undertones, provided designers and celebrities with fertile material to play with, making for a red carpet that was overrun with a funereal twist on floral.

Take influencer, and returning Vogue interviewer, Emma Chamberlain’s custom Jean Paul Gaultier look. Featuring entwined brown Chantilly lace that crept up and around a classic corset, inspired by a 2003 design, the look alluded to the overgrown brambles of an apocalyptic garden ravaged by the onslaught of time.

Like the smoking caterpillar from Alice in Wonderland, Zendaya’s first look was both transfixing and unsettling

Similarly, Lewis Hamilton, in Burberry, took a grave approach to the garden, coated in all-black, with blackened periwinkles, yuccas, daffodils, and cedar branches overlaying his woollen coat. Speaking about the design, Burberry chief creative officer, Daniel Lee, said: “His Met Gala look is inspired by the story of John Ystumllyn, one of Britain’s first Black gardeners, and by the language of flowers in Black history”.

Dark colours were dominant elsewhere. Kendall Jenner, in a piece from Alexander McQueen’s Givenchy 1999 couture collection, wore a sleek black dress paired with daring cut-outs and bronze fringe which ushered in an enchanting, and almost elven, feel to the evening’s outfits.

Co-chair, Zendaya, only exaggerated this with her surrealist looks. While her second outfit, a 1996 black gown from John Galliano’s Givenchy era, which featured a corseted bodice, puffy off-the-shoulder sleeve, and a tulle-wrapped bouquet fascinator, conformed to the more solemn interpretation of the night’s theme, it was her first look, a Maison Margiela Artisanal by John Galliano creation, that injected the night’s much-needed eccentricity.

Fanning’s transparent gown, with its sculptural bird features, and shimmering bodice was a simple yet show stopping lesson in how to breathe life into literary inspiration

Like the smoking caterpillar from Alice in Wonderland, Zendaya’s first look was both transfixing and unsettling, with the one-shouldered gown with a mermaid skirt featuring jewel-toned blue and green diagonal stripes and forbidden-fruit-like features. With a hummingbird wrapped around her neck and a mesh fascinator framing her gothic glam, Zendaya captured the essence of an enchanted garden, with all its startling peculiarities.

Barry Keoghan also embraced the bizarre, with a Carrollian inspiration for the ‘Garden of Time,’ with his Burberry suit, frilled dress-shirt, and top hat paying homage to the Mad Hatter. Pairing this with three watches, the first set to London time, the second to Dublin time, and the third to a poetic ‘nowhere,’ Keoghan ensured he was not going to be late to any garden tea, or after, party.

Amidst the doomy and eccentric interpretations of Ballard’s story, some turned to the former grace of the Count and Countess’ garden for inspiration. Met Gala icon, Gigi Hadid, wore a red-carpet stealing Thom Browne gown that took 20 people 5,000 hours to embroider, with the overskirt and train alone requiring a further 40 people 8,500 hours to embroider. The white dress itself, featured a single yellow rose, while the voluminous overskirt was adorned with hand-beaded thorns, vines, and more yellow roses. With an old Hollywood bob and classic makeup, Hadid’s look emphasised the delicacy of garden beauty.

The majority of men in attendance didn’t just play it safe, but they played it boring, turning up to a themed gala in standard black tuxes

Also alluding to a kind of delicacy was Tyla in her custom Balmain dress. While others highlighted the ‘garden’ of the ‘Garden of Time,’ Tyla turned to the idea of time with a sculptural sand dress. Olivier Rousteing, creative director of Balmain, told Vogue: “The inspiration behind this creation stemmed from a desire to redefine boundaries and transform a transient material into an everlasting masterpiece. The idea of sculpting a garment from something as ephemeral as sand ignited my imagination, and I could not be happier with the end result”. With an hourglass bag, complete with running sand, complementing the hourglass shape of the sand dress, Tyla truly embodied the sands of time.

Others turned to more traditional interpretations of Ballard’s story, as Elle Fanning did, also in Balmain. With Ballard describing the time flowers as fragile, frosty, and diamond-like, Fanning’s transparent gown, with its sculptural bird features, and shimmering bodice was a simple yet show stopping lesson in how to breathe life into literary inspiration, extracting the very best from Ballard’s imagination.

This year, it felt like the wells of creativity and inspiration had dried up

But not everybody was able to achieve such success. While crystal dresses swarmed the carpet, they often lacked the execution, intricacy, and innovation that Fanning’s gown achieved, ultimately falling short of the mark. Similarly, the majority of men in attendance didn’t just play it safe, but they played it boring, turning up to a themed gala in standard black tuxes.

With a theme that was already rich in imagination, and blooming with potential, very few looks were truly impressive. In comparison to recent themes, from ‘Camp: Notes on Fashion,’ to ‘Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination,’ designers and celebrities did not push the boundaries as they should have. Given that the Met Gala raises money for the museum’s Costume Institute, supporting the fragile art of historical fashion preservation, the evening is supposed to celebrate and showcase the potential of fashion, celebrating it as an art form. Yet, this year, it felt like the wells of creativity and inspiration had dried up. There were no Thierry Mugler archive pulls and it seriously lacked the avant-garde creations of previous years. In short, it was a little underwhelming.

But, in a way, Ballard’s The Garden of Time, is fitting. The ‘flowers’ – the striking looks, the daintily detailed looks, and the perfectly crafted looks – have been picked, proving that innovation and craftsmanship, inspiration and artistry are still alive. This will be enough to keep the fashion mob at bay, at last for another year, until the next first Monday of May.