The 2025 Costume Institute show at the Metropolitan Museum of Art will take inspiration from the work of author Monica L. Miller and explore the legacy of Black dandyism. On Wednesday, October 9, the Costume Institute announced that the exhibition title and theme of next year’s Met Gala is “Superfine: Tailoring Black Style.
” The co-chairs are style stars in their own right and will include actor Colman Domingo , race car driver Lewis Hamilton , rappers A$AP Rocky and Pharrell Williams, and, of course, Condé Nast creative director and Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour . NBA star LeBron James will also serve as honorary co-chair. According to Vogue , the exhibit will explore a style subculture called the Black dandy.
It will “illustrate how Black people transformed from being enslaved and stylized as luxury items, acquired like any other signifier of wealth and status, to autonomous self-fashioning individuals who are global trendsetters.” Drawing inspiration from guest curator Miller’s 2009 book, Slaves to Fashion: Black Dandyism and the Styling of Black Diasporic Identity , it will explore the history and legacy of Black dandyism through garments, paintings, photographs and various artifacts while tracing the style of Black men from the 18th century to today. Ahead of the announcement, Miller described Black dandyism as “a strategy and a tool to rethink identity, to reimagine the self in a different context.
To really push a boundary — especially during the.
