Met Gala 2025: First look into the Met exhibit 'Superfine: Tailoring Black Style'

UPDATED: May 6, 2025 00:34 IST

The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute unveiled its latest exhibition, Superfine: Tailoring Black Style, on Monday, 5 May, offering a bold re-examination of Black fashion through the lens of dandyism. The showcase precedes this year’s Met Gala, which has already set a fundraising record of $31 million.

Spanning over 300 years, the exhibit delves into how Black individuals have used style as both self-expression and resistance—challenging societal norms of race, class, gender, and sexuality. The concept of dandyism, which historically evoked images of European aristocratic flair, is reframed here through an African diasporic lens.

Inspired by an essay from writer and anthropologist Zora Neale Hurston, the exhibition is structured into twelve thematic sections, each illustrating a trait of dandyism—such as Champion, Beauty, Heritage, and Cosmopolitanism. Guest curator Monica Miller, whose work on Black dandyism formed the backbone of the show, noted, “We said, ‘Let’s see if we can think about 12 different ways to define dandyism.’ But they’re not definitive. There could be more.”

The space blends garments and accessories, portraiture, decorative arts, and photography from the 18th century to the present day. The result is a cultural tableau showcasing dandyism as both an aesthetic tradition and a strategic tool for social mobility and political expression.

Andrew Bolton, the Institute’s head curator, credited the late Vogue editor Andr Leon Talley for sparking the idea. “What happens to the figure of the dandy when he’s racialised?” Bolton asked. “That led me to Monica’s book. It’s an extraordinary cultural history of Black dandyism.”

Superfine not only celebrates elegance and innovation but confronts the complex histories of slavery, empire, and identity—proving that style, in the right hands, can be a radical act.