When the Costume Institute of the Metropolitan Museum of Art announced the 2025 theme for the Met Gala, the fashion world was irrevocably shaken. 'Superfine: Tailoring Black Style' will be the museum's spring 2025 exhibition, exploring the politics of race, identity, and power connected to fashion.
For the first time, the exhibition will solely feature fashion and art by designers of color, emphasizing menswear. The Costume Institute exhibited "Men in Skirts" in 2003 as the first focus on men's wear play on femineity.
The show's theme is inspired by Monica D. Miller's 2009 book Slaves to Fashion: Black Dandyism and the Styling of Black Diasporic Identity. Miller, a professor of Africana studies at Barnard College, is the exhibition's guest curator and became the Costume Institute's first Black curator.
Dandyism — as Miller describes — refers to the interpretation of the racialized system through deconstructing the contradicting categories of identities. Miller points out that a dandy is both "hypermasculine and feminine, aggressively heterosexual yet not quite a real man, an upstanding citizen and an outsider broadcasting his alien status."
The introduction of racial identity into the crosshairs of fashion and politics not only binds them together but also creates a new strand. And what's a theme for a fashion show without its co-chairs who not only personally exhibit the theme but also live it?
"In recent years, we've witnessed somewhat of a renaissance in menswear, spurred on by both established and emerging designers, as well as prominent men of style who've been more willing to take risks with their self-presentation," said Curator in Charge Andrew Bolton.
The line-up: one star-studded Hip-Hop artist and Bottega Veneta brand ambassador, A$AP Rocky; one Academy Award-nominated actor and playwright, Colman Domingo; one seven-time world champion Formula One driver and Dior Men ambassador, Lewis Hamilton; one Louis Vuitton men's creative director and influential musical producer, Pharell Williams; one global chief content officer of Conde Nast and longest-serving editor-in-chief of Vogue, Anna Wintour.
The honorary chair: Lebron James, one of the greatest basketball players and the NBA's first player to become a billionaire.
Many online had thoughts about the co-chair line-up and often shared their own alternatives, such as Dapper Dan. If you don't know who Dapper Dan is, let me tell you. Mr. Dan is an American fashion designer who popularized the use of logos from high-fashion luggage as wearable garments. He also intersected hip-hop culture and high fashion when brands didn't dress Black artists in the 90s.
However, while it's fair to say that Dan is a great alternative, the lineup is perfect. Miller points out that when Black dandyism erupted in the early twentieth century in Harlem, New York (where both Dapper Dan and A$AP Rocky were born), it functioned as a sign of a "modern black imaginary, a kind of "freedom dream." The ability to traverse from the performativity of dressing of whiteness to creating a new performativity for self. Modernism is true for Dan, but dandyism on playing cross-identity is not.
Miller adds that "the black dandy adds a deconstruction of racial and ethnic notions to queerness." Queerness — or quare — "struggle against all forms of oppression" while breaking down "limiting identity markers and propose new, more fluid categories."
The five men all combat the limitations on identity in their respective industries. The troubling "toxic masculinity" debate continuously stenches the environment where men shine. Yet, it's radical to say these men are the only ones making conversation.
However, it's true for Hamilton. Hamilton is the first and only Black driver currently on the grid. His race alone draws attention, given that the majority of the sport is European-centered. His style evolution is a topic of conversation every race weekend.
"I felt like I had to conform, like I had to be a certain shape. It’s like you have to be a square or a circle to get into this industry, and no other shapes fit," said Hamilton to celebrity stylist Law Roach for Interview Magazine. "I love how [fashion] tells stories, and you’re able to convey confidence. This last year, I’ve been able to utilize it and really show my stance on issues at the races."
Hamilton is a dandy when he experiments with garments unknown to the grid. He demonstrates a new strand of racial identity in politics when he wears silhouettes and patterns that cause others to gawk at him. If you're unfamiliar with how the remainder of the grid dresses, most of the drivers arrive wearing team gear, such as a sponsored hoodie and jeans.
Or, when actor Colman Domingo wore a lace glove with a tie-wrapped tuxedo while holding a cat bag to the Fourth Annual Academy Museum Gala. Domingo's ownership of the tuxedo is the intersection of masculinity and femininity; it becomes "queered and performed," as Miller writes.
Domingo's thing in fashion is the tuxedo. The tuxedo is the uniform for masculinity, but it's "more egalitarian" as "poor can pass for rich, men for women; class, gender, and perceived racial hierarchies can be disguised and confused," Miller points out. Domingo manipulates the uniform to create a new standard of formal wear for men.
"Working with my stylists,WaymanandMicah,we’ve always crafted story. No matter how I was dressing—because I’malwaysdressing—people are noticing it more now," said Domingo in Vanity Fair. "I’m a bit more understated—masculine cuts, tailoring. I like to feel sexy and playful."
Yet, while being a revolutionary is fashionably fun, the price was paid not long ago for the first Black man to appear on a Vogue cover. For the April 2008 issue, Lebron James appeared next to supermodel Gisele Bündchen. He dribbles a basketball while holding Gisele's waist in one arm. James' pose—as critics likened it—presents in a King Kong gorilla-like statue. The mayhem of controversy alluded the cover to the reinforcement of racial depiction of Black men as beastly-like, aggressive, and threatening.
"It wasn't a situation we're being rough or looking mean," James said. "Just showing a little emotion. We had a few looks and that was the best one we had."
What's interesting here is the connection to the Black dandyism. James is the first Black man to grace the cover of Vogue. The conflict is that James holds his personhood while being argued against as unhuman-like. Another is grappling with the hold-tight clutch of masculinity that dominates men's basketball while entering spaces of feminine dominance.
"Everything my name is on is going to be criticized in a good way or bad way," James said.
But that's what happens when race enters into the mainstream. The 2025 Met Gala attempts to correct the wrongs of exclusion in diversity means at the Costume Institute. The first Monday in May, the fashion show will change the conversation on societal expectations of the Black man to conform to the standard masculine uniform. The male co-chairs represent the new wave of dandyism in current culture, politics, and society. It's impossible not to see otherwise.
The chosen line-up will be studied years from now. Dandyism is in the mainstream of what it means to be a Black man confronting biases through dressing.
I'm excited for May 5th, nevertheless. RIP, Andre Leon Talley, and Chadwick Boseman. You would've loved the theme.
Song of choice: “When I’m Small” by Phantogram. About a month ago, I was humming to the Phantogram’s other popular song “Fall in Love,” which I couldn’t get out of my head. Then as I running errands, I played a Phantogram radio and this song played. I’ve been obsessed with it ever since, especially as I’ve been nonstop listening to alternative music for the past three-weeks.
