Everything You Need to Know About the 2024 Met Gala: “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion”

This year will be a big one for Disney princesses. The live action Snow White and Princess and the Frog films are set to premiere in 2024, and now, to the untrained eye, it could seem like the Met Gala was hopping on the Disney bandwagon with their theme for the upcoming fashion spectacle: “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion.” In reality, though, the 2024 Met Gala has noting to do with a talking mouse and a gaggle of cursed princesses. Confused? Let us explain everything we know about the 2024 Met Gala so far, including how to interpret this seemingly vague theme.

What is the theme of the 2024 Met Gala?

As mentioned, next year’s exhibit will be titled “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion.” But don’t expect Zendaya to arrive to the event as Cinderella once again. Instead, the theme is more focused on “nature as a metaphor for fashion and for its fragility and its ephemerality,” according to Andrew Bolton, the head curator of the Costume Institute. It will also include an exploration of the past, with an emphasis on historic clothing that can no longer be worn, as the materials that comprise them have deteriorated over time. The complementing exhibit will attempt to bring these pieces back to life with the magic of museum display, but on the red carpet, it will be up to the celebrities and designers to interpret this idea themselves.

Loewe—along with TikTok—will serve as sponsors for the exhibit, which means we should expect a surplus of Jonathan Anderson’s designs on the red carpet.

What is the dress code of the 2024 Met Gala?

Although the official theme of the Met Gala revolves around the museum’s exhibition, “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion,” attendees have been asked to abide by a specific dress code. This year, that code is “The Garden of Time,” based on a 1962 short story of the same title written by J.G. Ballard. The story centers around two aristocrats, a Count and Countess, who reside in an idyllic villa that overlooks a garden brimming with crystal-like flowers and leaves. There is a Ballardian element to the story, which, per experts, connotes “dystopian modernity, bleak artificial landscapes, and the psychological effects of technological, social, or environmental developments.” Per Tiktok, a sponsor of the Met Gala, the dress code “is about fleeting beauty. The most obvious interpretation would be to embrace the “garden” part of ‘The Garden of Time.’”

“It is very much an ode to nature and the emotional poetics of fashion,” Bolton explained, adding “One thing I hope this show will activate is that sensorial appreciation of fashion.”

Who is chairing the 2024 Met Gala?

While Anna Wintour always serves as a chair, traditionally she’s selected a few bold-faced names to help her out on the chairing committee. This year isn’t short on star power—Bad Bunny, Chris Hemsworth, Jennifer Lopez, Zendaya, and Wintour will all serve as official co-chairs. Loewe creative director Jonathan Anderson and TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew will serve as honorary chairs during the biggest night in fashion.

What will be included in the Met Gala’s accompanying exhibit?

It’s easy to forget, but with every Met Gala comes an accompanying show at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute. This year, the appropriately titled exhibit “Sleeping Beauties” will open to the public on May 10 and on view through September 2nd. It will feature about 250 items from the Costume Institute’s permanent collection, some of which have rarely been seen in public. The connecting thread weaving all the exhibited pieces together will be the theme of nature, which will also serve as a metaphor for the transience of fashion.

Designers featured within the exhibit include everyone from modern marvels like Phillip Lim, Stella McCartney, and Conner Ives, to the canon of classics like Elsa Schiaparelli, Yves Saint Laurent, and Christian Dior. In fact, the exhibit will span 400 years, displaying everything from 17th-century Elizabethan pieces to designs from the 2024 season. Bolton told The New York Times that he’s recently acquired pieces from younger labels like Collina Strada and Phoebe English.

Bolton says one thing he hopes “this show will activate is that sensorial appreciation of fashion.” The term “Sleeping Beauties” comes from about 50 pieces from the collection—including a silk satin ballgown created by American couturier Charles Frederick Worth in 1877—that are too delicate to be worn any longer. Through innovative forms of display, including video animation, light projection, soundscaping, AI, and CGI, these pieces will come to life once again. With this technology, viewers will be able to experience what it was like to feel, move, hear, smell, and interact with these downs in their prime. The really old pieces will be displayed in glass cases, giving museum-goers the ability to really see the clothing’s deterioration.

Clearly an expansive exhibit, the pieces will be split up into various galleries, each exploring a different theme inspired by nature, and each featuring both historical and contemporary fashion. One gallery, for example, will be arranged like a garden, greenhouse included. Hats will bloom with flowers, and a Loewe coat designed by Jonathan Anderson will feature oat, rye, and wheat grass, not unlike the foliage-adorned pieces he presented as part of the brand’s spring/summer 2023 menswear collection. The coat will begin its life on May 10th, and slowly die as the exhibit continues in the subsequent months.

When is the 2024 Met Gala?

One consistency in life is that the Met Gala will always land on the first Monday in May, and next year will be no different. The 2024 event will take place on Monday, May 6.