LGBT+ celebrities show off their best Met Gala looks
Janelle Monae, Cara Delevingne and Michael Urie graced the Met Gala carpet with some of the night’s best looks. (Jamie McCarthy (L) and Dimitrios Kambouris (C, R) /Getty Images for The Met Museum/Vogue)
LGBT+ celebrities wore some of the best looks spotted at the Met Gala on Monday (May 6).
The annual event is held in support of the Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art’s Costume Institute, which this year hosts an exhibition titled “Camp: Notes on Fashion,” based on American author’s Susan Sontag’s 58-page essay Notes on ‘Camp,’ published in 1964.
Met Gala co-chairs wear stunning looks
The Met Gala was chaired as always by US Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour, who was joined by singer Harry Styles, performer Lady Gaga and tennis champion Serena Williams as co-chairs while Gucci creative director Alessandro Michele underwrote the exhibition.
Michele and Styles sported some of the evening’s best outfits, along with the show-stopping Billy Porter and the mesmerising Ezra Miller.
But Lady Gaga too did her best not to be upstaged, presenting not one, not two but four Brandon Maxwell outfits in a Russian doll-style performance of campness on the pink carpet.
Lady Gaga offered a performance of campness on the Met Gala pink carpet. (Angela Weiss/AFP/Getty)
Lena Waithe, who already foreshadowed the camp theme at the 2018 Met Gala when she wore a giant LGBT pride cape, made a strong statement with her outfit.
Waithe and designer Kerby Jean-Raymond, also known as Pyer Moss’ Kerbito, wore matching, tailored suits.
“Camp all the way, camping all day.”
— Cara Delevingne
The pin stripe in the Waithe’s suit was created by the lyrics to Diana Ross’ “I’m Coming Out” song, while the golden buttons represented camp icons to which The Chi writer and producer wanted to pay homage.
“Black drag queens invented camp” Waithe’s suit read at the back.
“I really wanted to make sure my outfit represented black drag queens who really started out this whole camp thing by being over the top and all that jazz,” she told E! News.
Producer Ryan Murphy also wore a suit, although his was a pastel, glittery orange completed with a high-collar cape decorated with pearls and sequins.
One Twitter user likened the Christian Siriano outfit to Sandro Botticelli’s Renaissance painting “The Birth of Venus,” writing: “Ryan Murphy giving us Birth of Venus, though points deducted for not surrounding himself with winged revelers.”
Ryan Murphy ‘s Met Gala outfit was likened to The Birth of Venus. (Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty for The Met Museum/Vogue)
Actor Michael Urie decided to wear both a dress and a pinstripe suit for his Met Gala outfit, presenting the embodiment of gender-defying fashion.
Also a Christian Siriano creation, Urie’s contrasting outfit was perfect in every detail, from his hair and make up to the Doc Martens black boot at the bottom of the pink gown’s side and the satin heeled pump on the other, suited up side.
Michael Urie wore both a gown and a suit at the Met Gala. (Neilson Barnard/Getty)
Another Met Gala attendee who bended binaries was performer Janelle Monae—another star who worked with Christian Siriano to create her stunning, surrealism-inspired look.
Monae’s outfit is truly eye-catching—not just for its hat-on-hat top hat, its unusual shape or the Picasso-eque details, but also because the eyelid actually blinks as Monae moves. All together, a masterclass of camp.
the big lash on Janelle Monáe’s dress BLINKS?? DETAILS people, it’s all in the DETAILS! #MetGala pic.twitter.com/JkHMbvIcEI
— #1 crystal geyser stan (@beyninis) May 7, 2019
Christian Siriano also created a stunning—albeit, in comparison, more subdued—look for Orange is the New Black star and trans rights campaigner Laverne Cox, who attended the Met Gala for the first time.
Laverne Cox has a big shoulder moment at the Met Gala. (Jamie McCarthy/Getty)
Supermodel Cara Delevingne was the personification of over-the-top, showing up in a Dior rainbow-striped dress and matching cane and platform heels topped by an extravagant headpiece.
When asked what the inspiration for the look was, she jokingly answered “pain” before adding: “No I’m joking. Obviously camp. Camp all the way, camping all day.”
Cara Delevingne joked the inspiration behind her Met Gala outfit was “pain.” (Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images for The Met Museum/Vogue)
Love, Simon star Keiynan Lonsdale also picked a colourful outfit for the event, which he attended for the first time this year.
Lonsdale, who recently featured in a gender-defying photoshoot with Ezra Miller for Vogue, wore a Manish Arora gown styled with hundreds of butterflies.
“Attending my first MET tonight (super chill), def not nervous & def got no butterflies” Lonsdale joked on Twitter ahead of the event.
Keiynan Lonsdale joked about having “no butterflies” before walking the pink carpet. (Jamie McCarthy/Getty)
Sarah Paulson’s black gown is understated compared to some of the other pink carpet’s looks, but look closely and you’ll spot a clip adding realness to her Jeremy Scott-designed bow tie-adorned dress.
And can we talk about the champagne bag? It’s all in the details.
The details elevate Sarah Paulson’s gown. (Andrew Toth/Getty for The Mark Hotel)
Ahead of the Met Gala, Wintour said in an interview with Tina Brown last month she was “hoping that someone will arrive in hiking boots and a backpack.”
Perhaps the closest to achieving that look was rapper Frank Ocean, who showed up in a black hooded Prada parka.
Frank Ocean took out a camera as photographers were taking pictures of him. (Jamie McCarthy/Getty Images)
Vogue labeled him a “contrarian,” but as the “Thinkin’ Bout You” singer took out his own camera to capture the photographers who were taking pictures of him, it became clear that there was method to the apparent madness.
