This yr, Vogue is ensuring there are not any excuses in relation to executing the 2025 Met Gala Theme and Costume Code. In just some weeks, stars will collect on the Metropolitan Museum of Artwork’s Costume Institute for the Blackest Met Gala we’ve ever seen. Impressed by Monica L. Miller’s “Slaves to Vogue: Black Dandyism and the Styling of Black Diasporic Id,” this yr, the Met Gala’s theme, “Superfine: Tailoring Black Fashion,” and costume code, “Tailor-made for You,” will highlight the intersection of trend and Black identification.
Main as much as what many know to be “the largest night time in trend,” phrases like “dandyism” and “dandy” have gained new recognition. However what’s a dandy? And extra importantly, what’s a Black dandy?
In response to Merriam Webster, dandy displays “a person who provides exaggerated consideration to private look” or “one thing wonderful in its class.” Miller echoed this definition in a latest video with Vogue.
“The dictionary definition of dandyism is someone who research above all else, to decorate elegantly and fashionably,” the scholar and exhibit visitor curator shared. “When the dandy is Black, we get to see the dandy as a determine that actually encapsulates a type of matrix of identification, race, gender, class, sexuality, and generally nation.”
Dandyism: the place historical past, tradition, and self-expression collide
Like many issues in Black trend, dandyism displays historical past and tradition. The Black dandy displays a person who distinguishes themselves via their clothes. Vogue historian Shelby Ivey Christie notes that Black dandyism might be traced all the way in which again to slavery, and figures like William Lee, George Washington’s valet. Regardless of being restricted to the confines of his uniform, Lee discovered delicate methods to showcase his private type via his clothes, which Christie explains reworked “an emblem for his oppression right into a canvas of his self-expression.”
“Black dandyism evolves all through historical past as a type of visible resistance,” she continued.
This sartorial resistance and expression carries into the Harlem Renaissance via figures like Cab Calloway, James Baldwin, Langston Hughes, Gladys Bentley, Ma Rainey, and plenty of extra. One other place the place dandyism thrived was the Black church. The notion of placing in your Sunday’s greatest is without doubt one of the first locations folks work together with dandyism. From the boldly coloured and generally printed fits to the aunties with their extravagantly polished church hats, that customized tackle excessive trend birthed visions of Black dandies throughout generations and social courses.
As time has developed trendy dandyism was mirrored via figures like Dapper Dan, André 3000, Janelle Monae, André Leon Talley, Teyana Taylor, Doechii, Jidenna, Tyler, the Creator, and so forth. and naturally the 2025 Met Gala’s historic all Black male co-chairs Pharrell Williams, A$AP Rocky, Lewis Hamilton, and Colman Domingo.
Dandyism is extra than simply fits and tailor-made seems to be
Whereas fine-tailored fits are a key a part of dandyism, they don’t seem to be the one issue on this aesthetic. As Regulation Roach defined, being a dandy is “telling your story via your garments” and never being afraid to face out. However standing out and boldly going towards the established order is an act of resistance, particularly for Black folks, whether or not accomplished consciously or subconsciously.
“Black type is basically associated to interested by how trend and energy join. The way in which that persons are styled, or trend themselves, in response to the diploma of company that they really feel,” Miller defined. “[Think] about clothes, costume, and trend as a instrument, as a critique, and likewise as a artistic mode of interested by liberation.”
“You see quite a lot of creativity within the historical past of Black type as a result of it’s our armor. It’s a instrument in our toolbox to get via life, to make it simpler to get into sure rooms,” added Jerry Lorenzo, artistic director of the model, Worry of God.
Individuality, excellence, freedom, wit, class, tailoring, confidence, Black expression, Black excellence are simply a number of the many phrases stars within the 2025 Vogue Met Situation used to explain dandyism.
Now, whereas we might not grace the Met Gala steps (until Vogue decides to ask this author, through which case I’m taking all of you with me), it’s vital that we perceive the affect of dandyism on not solely trend but additionally Black communities and tradition. These fits, these high hats, canes, equipment, and silhouettes are tailor-made to inform a narrative, and hopefully, the designs we see on this yr’s Met Gala steps honor that.
Plus, it doesn’t harm that understanding the theme will make enjoying trend police on Could 5 much more fascinating.
