New Delhi: The 2027 Met Gala has a new theme. The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York announced on Thursday that next year’s event will celebrate everyday fashion, from jeans and T-shirts to hoodies and puffer jackets. The announcement comes two months after the museum cancelled a planned exhibition on designer John Galliano following criticism over his past antisemitic and racist remarks.
The theme is extraORDINARY: Fashion and the Poetics of the Everyday. The exhibition will examine how designers have transformed ordinary clothes into high fashion. It will also feature clothes made from unconventional materials such as paper, plastic and metal.
The Met Gala will take place on 3 May 2027, while the exhibition will open to the public on 9 May. More than 200 pieces will be on display, including designs by Martin Margiela, Comme des Garçons, Bottega Veneta, Burberry and Moncler.
From denim to puffer gowns
A pair of jeans from Bottega Veneta’s 2022 collection looks like regular denim but is actually made entirely of leather. The jeans were designed by Matthieu Blazy. The exhibition will also feature a Vetements gown resembling a T-shirt, puffer gowns designed by Pierpaolo Piccioli for Moncler, and clothes made from paper and broken china.
Andrew Bolton, curator of the Met’s Costume Institute, told Vogue that he wanted visitors to look at everyday clothes differently. The exhibition will also explore how designers have repurposed old or discarded materials to create something new.
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Met drops planned John Galliano exhibition
The Met had originally planned an exhibition titled John Galliano: Horizons, which would have covered the British designer’s four-decade career. However, when the museum announced the show in July, Jewish community leaders and others criticised the decision to honour him.
Galliano was fired from Dior in 2011 after videos emerged of him making antisemitic and racist remarks at a Paris bar. He was later found guilty of antisemitic abuse by a French court.
On 31 August, the Met and Galliano announced that the exhibition had been cancelled. Galliano said he understood that celebrating his work would be painful for some people.
Bolton told Vogue that he had not expected the Galliano exhibition to be cancelled.
“I didn’t have a plan B,” he said.
He also did not want to put together a smaller exhibition simply because the original plan had fallen through. Bolton said he wanted the replacement to be just as ambitious and beautiful as the Galliano show.
The exhibition will run until 9 January 2028. The Met has not yet announced the dress code or co-chairs for next year’s gala.
(Edited by Maryam Hassan)