It's the first Monday in May. AKA it's time for the annual Met Gala. Or as some call it, "fashion's biggest night." Celebrities will walk the steps of the Metropolitan Museum of Art hoping their looks live up to the annual theme of the gala. This year's theme is a special one. It's called "Superfine: Tailoring Black Style," and it's the very first Black fashion tradition to be selected for the theme of the Costume Institute's fundraiser. Brittany and her guests, culture writer Shelton Boyd-Griffith and editor-in-chief of Black Fashion Fair Antoine Gregory, discuss how celebrities can be sure to be on theme and how the theme is rooted in the very first fashion statements made by enslaved people.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy
Chapter 1: What is the significance of the Met Gala theme 'Superfine: Tailoring Black Style'?
Because tonight, we all get to be fashion critics as celebrities and designers show out at the 2025 Met Gala. And this year, I'm here to give you a guidebook for how to judge the best and worst looks of the night. So every year, the Met Gala has a theme. And every year, some people get it and some people just don't. This year's theme is a special one and a bit complicated.
It's called Superfine, tailoring black style, and it's a celebration of the black dandy. You might already know what a black dandy is, but if you don't, here's a picture.
Chapter 2: Who are the iconic figures associated with Black Dandyism?
It's rooted in, like, traditional sartorial, like, suiting. But then it's also juxtaposed with, like, someone who's more, like, peacocky and, like, more exuberant. It is, like, a Billy Porter, which is rooted in, like, this queerness. But then also, like, it is Dapper Dan and it is, like, A$AP Rocky. And early Danelle Monáe.
Oh, absolutely.
Yes.
With the tuxedos and the updo and recalling James Brown.
Yes.
Absolutely. Absolutely. In practice, it's all about tailoring and exaggerated or flamboyant takes on menswear. We're talking suits with a twist, top hats, traditional menswear with black flair.
In theory, dandyism is like an aesthetic, but it's also like a lifestyle of like rebellion and subversion. So it really is such a wide, expansive term.
That's because dandyism is rooted in the very first transgressive fashion statements enslaved Black people made when they first set foot in America. We'll get into that later. But first, fashion writer Shelton Boyd Griffith.
Thank you for having us.
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Chapter 3: How should celebrities dress to embody Black Dandyism at the Met Gala?
Anton, you just took my person, so thanks.
Tell it.
Janelle Monáe. I think, like, styling her is, like, an homage to, like, those Black queer women who, like, subvert, like, menswear. Absolutely.
I think for me, I would want to go with someone probably like Stephon Diggs because I think he takes so many amazing risks fashion-wise. Mm. And I think we would be able to kind of create something that is a bit more flamboyant and a little bit more fun that I think where other people like in sports and rap may not take those same risks. I think he's definitely more of a risk taker.
I love that. I love that. Especially, I mean, I feel like Black Dandyism shows up so much across how athletes dress. Yeah. But for me, though, I would absolutely want to dress Queen Latifah. Queen Latifah is a Tom Brown girly. Tom Brown queen. Okay. So she's very often wearing something that is structured and kind of referencing menswear anyway.
I just feel like Queen Latifah would really be it in a full tuxedo with the tails. She would body that. I feel like now that she was at Coachella, I'm like, maybe she'll actually be out and about and want to mix with us. Because she doesn't have to.
That's a good one. I think to that same point, like Missy Elliott. Oh, yeah. Imagine Missy. Oh, so good.
Let's talk Met Gala themes for a second. This year, it's Black Dandyism. In the past, it's been punk or camp or something called Heavenly Bodies, which is a celebration of the aesthetics of the Catholic church, which I'll admit, I love that one. But no matter the theme, the thing is sometimes people on the red carpet get it and sometimes people don't.
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Chapter 4: What are common challenges in interpreting Met Gala themes?
I'd say Kim Kardashian actually gets it about 30 to 50% of the time. Now, I did think that she did good though with the camp year when she did the full water drop thing. I thought that was incredible.
That was beautiful, the Mugler. I think that a lot of people like confuse the theme of the exhibition in the dress code. And I don't think that they lean into the inspiration of the exhibition.
Right, because for people who don't know, the Met Gala is tied to an annual exhibition at the Met Museum.
You know, when people are looking to get dressed up, they want to get dressed up how they want. They're like, this is a nice event. Do I really care about the brief?
They want to look good. They want to look like their definition of what's good as opposed to... I want to wear my, you know, my gown.
My beautiful gal. It's mainly the men. The men will be in their black and white tuxes, which is a bit boring because, like, there's so much fun in menswear now.
Okay, so I'm wondering, though, with this theme, do you think that black dandyism is something that people are going to know how to interpret? And why or why don't you think so?
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Chapter 5: Why is the Met Gala's recognition of Black fashion history important?
I mean, I do. I think because, like, at its core, it's black people wearing well-structured tailored suits. To me, it's going to be very difficult to get this wrong. But it's going to be even more difficult to pull a really incredible look.
I think people are going to have to be a bit more expressive, take more risk, do the top hats, do the canes, do feathers, do whatever you need to do to really accentuate the costume.
Well, I will say, I feel like Vogue has been very intentional about explaining the theme. Like when it was announced last year, some people, even I myself was like, oh, we'll see how this goes. Because sometimes when people want to interpret Black style, they get a little too creative. And also this time around, they have not just their chairs who are chairing the event.
They also have a hosting committee. I get the feeling that they really want people to understand the theme, maybe even just for plausible deniability in case Kim Kardashian comes through with a do-rag. They could just be like, listen now, we didn't say to do that. That's hilarious. You decided to do that. We'll see who gets the theme right.
And tomorrow, we'll be back in this feed with a special bonus episode rating the best and worst looks of the night. But ahead of the event, I want to get more into the history of the theme, especially with how it relates to this moment. This, after all, is the very first Met Gala theme that explicitly celebrates Black fashion.
It's been decades of Black people topping the best dress list, and now fashion's biggest night is recognizing Black contributions to fashion. What do you all make of the Costume Institute highlighting a Black fashion lineage in this moment when diversity and inclusion are on the outs?
For me personally, it's a double-edged sword. I think on one hand, like, it's this beautiful moment of, like, centering Black expression. It's not just about Black style. It's about, like, the history of, like, Blackness and history of, like, the diaspora. And, like, some of that is ugly. You know, it is chattel slavery. It is Jim Crow.
Like, it is everything that, like, this administration is, like, trying to, like, erase. But it's, like, presented in this beautiful way. Obviously, this was planned, like, before the administration, you know, overhaul of, like, DEI. But I think that it existing now is really important.
But then on the other hand, I think I was like talking to some colleagues about like 2020, how like there was like this huge push where let's get someone Black. Let's have this focus on Black designers. Now, like so much of that support and like that exposure is kind of like missing. So I don't want this just to be like a moment. And then like we go back to regularly scheduled programming.
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Chapter 6: What are the implications of Black designers being featured at the Met Gala?
now be featured at this event that's sponsored by Louis Vuitton. But even the tension of that to me is kind of, hmm, you know what I mean? At the end of the day, this big brand still gets to profit from the association with this person whose work they did spend some time trying to suppress decades ago.
I am interested in seeing how Black designers are represented on the carpet and if they are at all. Yeah. When I think of just like all the incredible work that we've done, we still haven't been able to take ownership over it. We still have to be an accessory to a white institution.
So as incredible as this is, it's like, what can we do to regain some type of ownership over the work that we're creating in our creative production as people?
Coming up, Antoine Shelton and I are looking at the history the Met Gala theme is pulling from, from quote unquote luxury slaves, all the way up to the most powerful people at Vogue magazine. Stick around.
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Okay, so Monica L. Miller is one of the co-curators of the exhibit at the Met. And she wrote this book about the history of black dandyism. It's called Slaves to Fashion. And in it, she talks about, quote, luxury slaves. Some enslavers treated the young black boys that they enslaved like pets or accessories and dressed them in fancy clothes.
And you can see this in old portraiture featured in the book. As Miller puts it, these boys were, quote, luxury items collected like any other signifier of wealth and status. And on days they were allowed to dress up, some enslaved people would mend or adorn their own clothing with flair.
Sometimes they had these very fashion-forward looks with the clothes they were given or would, quote, borrow from their enslavers. This was one of the only ways enslaved people could express their individuality and bodily autonomy, and even despite some states' sumptuary laws that limited what Black people could wear or how they could style themselves.
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