This year’s Met Gala pays tribute to fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld, who died in 2019, aged 85.
Marking the unveiling of the Metropolitan Museum’s exhibition Karl Lagerfeld: A Line of Beauty, the biggest night in the fashion calendar – which always takes place on the first Monday in May – attracts A-listers from all over the world.
Every design starts with a sketch.✨
— The Metropolitan Museum of Art (@metmuseum) September 30, 2022
Coming May 2023—explore the artistic methodology and stylistic vocabulary of Karl Lagerfeld's designs in "Karl Lagerfeld: A Line of Beauty" at The Met's #CostumeInstitute. pic.twitter.com/8KpP591WGn
Stars invited to the exclusive evening ascend the famous steps of the Met in outfits intended to reflect the exhibition’s theme – many of them couture creations – and enjoy a preview of the show before it opens on 5 May.
Ahead of the Met Gala (1 May), we look back at why Karl Lagerfeld was so revered in the fashion industry…
Prolific designer
Renowned for his artistic abilities and inexhaustible creativity, German-born Lagerfeld was creative director at French fashion house Chanel from 1983 until his death.
He was also the creative director of Italian label Fendi, as well as his eponymous fashion label, and was said to design up to 17 collections each year.
He presided over many of Chanel’s jaw-dropping catwalk shows, including the 2014 supermarket set and 2018’s indoor beach, complete with sand and lapping waves.
Culture connoisseur
To fuel his creativity, Lagerfeld consumed vast amounts of art, music and culture.
Famously arranging the books in his vast library horizontally instead of vertically, the designer also said he owned 300 iPods loaded with different genres of music.
Friends and foes
Lagerfeld surrounded himself with a coterie of celebrity friends and fans, counting actor Diane Kruger, model Cara Delevingne and designer Donatella Versace among his confidantes. And he was said to bestow Chanel handbags as gifts to celebrities at their first shoot with the brand.
Lagerfeld also had a long-standing relationship with Vogue editor Anna Wintour, who oversees both the benefit committee and the guest list of the Met Gala. Although the theme itself is chosen to match the upcoming exhibition taking place at the Metropolitan Museum.
Consisting of about 150 pieces, the Lagerfeld exhibition will be curated by Andrew Bolton, the Costume Institute's Wendy Yu Curator in Charge, and Amanda Harlech, a collaborator of Lagerfeld's.
As prolific as he was within the fashion industry, by his own admission, the designer was far from universally adored.
"All the other designers hate me," he said in a 2018 interview with Numéro Magazine, listing Azzedine Alaïa and Yves Saint Laurent co-founder Pierre Bergé among his ‘enemies’.
Following the designer's death, New York Times fashion critic Vanessa Friedman wrote: "He offended people right and left, making as much of an art out of the cutting aside as the perfectly cut double-face gown".
Lagerfeld voiced some more controversial opinions as well, around topics including the #MeToo movement and plus-size women, meaning not everyone is pleased with the choice of this year’s Met Gala theme.
When the theme was announced, actor and activist Jameela Jamil wrote the following on Instagram:
"Karl Lagerfeld is the theme for the entire Met Gala next year. This man... was indeed, supremely talented, but used his platform is such a distinctly hateful way, mostly towards women, so repeatedly and up until the last years of his life, showing no remorse, offering no atonement, no apology, no help to groups he attacked... there was no explanation for his cruel outbursts."
Personal style
Lagerfeld's signature style was as famous as – if not more so – than his designs.
Rarely photographed in anything except a high-collared white shirt, black tie and suit, the fashion icon liked to accessorise his outfits with fingerless gloves and black sunglasses.
He always wore his silver hair pulled back in a ponytail and occasionally carried a chic black or white fan.
A way with words
Not one to mince his words, Lagerfeld didn’t shy away from sharing his opinions about trends, celebrities and fellow designers.
He said of Yves Saint Laurent to Observer Magazine: "He is very middle-of-the-road French, very pied-noir, very provincial."
Some declarations were more amusing: "People I’m really friendly with have faxes. Anna Wintour has one."
While others were profound – he told The New Yorker: "I do my job like I breathe. So if I can’t breathe I’m in trouble."
His famous feline
Lagerfeld didn’t have children, but he doted on his beautiful blue-eyed cat Choupette, who is still alive today and has 141k followers on Instagram.
"I don’t even think I’m that famous. Now, Choupette really is famous," he told British Vogue.
"She has become the most famous cat in the world. I even get propositioned by pet food companies and things like that, but it’s out of the question. I’m commercial. She’s not. She’s spoiled to death. Obviously."
Choupette is rumoured to be attending the Met Gala – if so, the cat will join co-chairs of the event Dua Lipa, Michaela Coel, Penélope Cruz and Roger Federer on the museum’s famous steps.
