Every year at the Met Gala it seems there are more and more designers who JUST DON’T GET IT! Attendance of designer + mannequins + entourage is a big investment, which brings with it increasing pressure to garner some good press coverage, so they treat the red carpet like an extension of their runway and send their ladies out in an assortment of looks that just have nothing to do with anything. Some of them play it safe, and some of them go bonkers in entirely the wrong way…
What the actual HELL is this? I’m beginning to feel like Kate Upton is being meangirled by the fashion elite. From being forced to fork out for her own ticket two years ago, to being put in this boring, ill-fitting mess last year, will someone just give the girl a break? She’s gorgeous and she’s pretty likable, and while she fits the mould of the archetypal Dolce & Gabanna voluptuous sex kitten, she would be better served by a dress that didn’t make her look like a widowed flamenco dancer working in a brothel. If they weren’t already going to prison for tax evasion, they should be locked up for that dress, with additional time for this:
and a further sentence for this, to run concurrently.
And the haute disasters did not end there, oh no! Ain’t no crazy like some Lagerfeld crazy, and I have to give to props to young Chloe Moretz for being game enough to go along with this. Teenage girls are a narcissistic bunch, and there aren’t many who would pass up the chance to go to an actual ball dressed a pretty princess, and willingly turn up looking like a Victorian schoolmarm who’s accidentally found herself running a saloon bar in the Wild West instead. I would watch that movie, but it’s a terrible concept for a dress.
Still, it took balls and conviction to wear that, and I’m sorry it didn’t work out better for her. I’m not sorry at all for Anna Wintour, because if anyone should be leading by example it’s her, and if she can’t be bothered making an effort, why would anyone else? Then again, we are talking about a woman who has one pair of shoes and one pair of boots, and so has worn the exact same nude, kitten heel sandals for the last fifteen years or so. I’m convinced these are those once again, and she’s had Manolo stick some bling on them.
Borrrr-ing. I find Kristen Stewart’s Chanel look vaguely more interesting, and using the words “interesting” and “Kristen Stewart” in the same sentence is a first for me, but head to toe it came off the Chanel couture runway, which means they made zero effort to make it work for the Met Gala. I like what Chanel are doing with this optical illusion around the waistline business, but ultimately you can’t wear a sweater to the Met Gala, I don’t care how many feathers you have on your skirt.
You also can’t realise, a year too late, that you have the perfect look for last year’s theme, and you’re going to rock on in there like an ethereal fairy punk regardless…
If this had been last year I would have been all over Nicole Richie’s devoré velvet Donna Karan dress, but it’s not last year, it’s this year, and even though I don’t hate, it just doesn’t work. I DO, with every fiber of my being, hate this Donna Karan look on Rita Ora, who went as quite a different kind of fairy.
I mean, there’s always one, the girl who can’t resist the tulle and the sparkles and the chance to dress like a twinkly fairy princess, but never in a million years did I expect that girl to be Rita Ora, and if she thinks she’s sexed it up a bit with those hideous PEARLISED THIGH HIGH BONDAGE SHOES (take a moment to wrap your brain around that concept) she is sadly mistaken. This is hands down one of the most hideous looks of the night and Kate Upton owes her a debt of gratitude.
Or does she owe a debt of gratitude to Michelle Monaghan, who completely missed the mark in this oxblood leather Altuzarra disaster. The only time fringing has any business being on a red carpet is if it’s beaded, flapper style. Leather, Pocahontas style, belongs on Vanessa Hudgens at Coachella, and that hideous necklace belongs in a museum display case next to the Ardagh Chalice.
There’s a touch of the museum piece about Rosie Huntington Whitley’s gladiatorial Balmain too. I wasn’t a fan of this when Shailene Woodley wore a bile green tie-front version to the MTV Awards, and if you’d asked me then what I might do to improve it, I certainly wouldn’t have said “Make it leopard print.”
I will say, she is wearing the hell out of it; it’s a very striking look, and the dress itself is an incredible cut and mesmerisingly detailed. But if you’re offered a ticket next year and you’re wondering what to wear to the Met Gala, a good rule of thumb is that if someone already wore it to the MTV Awards, maybe go in a different direction.
Another good rule of thumb is: don’t settle. If your dress looks like you made it yourself in a 12 week beginners sewing course, like Joy Bryant’s Marchesa, keep looking.
And speaking of home sewing, I wonder how long Shailene Woodley was working on this little arts and crafts project? It must be difficult to keep a hobby like this going when you’re couch-surfing amongst the new friends that you met at that organic seed convention last summer, and maybe for Shailene this dress is her version of an old, comforting quilt. It’s woven from love, good vibes and happy memories, and has been lovingly pieced together from scraps of fabric she cut from the sofas, curtains, tablecloths and wedding dresses of her hippy friends, with that carefree disregard for material possessions that only the sickeningly wealthy can have.
Those same friends who never figured out how to say “please don’t sunbathe your vagina in the front yard” without seeming oppressive, and who are currently wondering if they should sell their couch, or if the star of four major movies from the last twelve months will just go ahead and get her own place this year.
And the last golden rule? If you’re going to wear a designer like Giambattista Valli, don’t go for the blandest thing he’s ever made, especially if your name is Amber Heard and you’re already the blandest woman your fiancé has ever dated.
Nobody wants to be the personification of their own dress for all the wrong reasons, but if one of the perks of marrying Buster Keaton there is status and access to the best designer clothes in the world, don’t make choices that emphasise what a basic bitch you are. Fashion can be your friend, it can get you the attention you crave and make you seem interesting, and God knows Amber Heard needs all the help she can get in that department.
TDD.
“…she would be better served by a dress that didn’t make her look like a widowed flamenco dancer working in a brothel.” lol, love the classic Carolyn comment!
I don’t really mind Anna Wintour’s dress. Johnny Depp looks like a sad penguin, Kristen has got the most awkward stance ever and that teal number with the ivory lace is dreadful!
If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a thousand times… Marchesa are THE WORST!
So much so that they eventually got their own post!
http://www.thedressdown.com/cannes-marchesa-worst-dresses/
Much like Johnny Depp who got his own Dress Down back in March.
http://www.thedressdown.com/we-need-to-talk-about-johnny/
And I think Kirsten might be due one too!
Chloe is worst for me. Chanel plus Wild West is a terrible idea.