Actress Sydney Sweeney is wearing a black beaded Miu Miu gown, telling Vogue it’s her third time wearing the designer at the Met Gala.
“I always feel they bring such beautiful stories to every dress,” she said, adding that the look is “paying homage” to Kim Novak, the classic Hollywood actress she will portray in the film “Scandalous.”
The film marks Met Gala co-chair Colman Domingo’s directorial debut.
“I’m doing a movie with Colman Domingo so we wanted to really just bring that to life,” Sweeney said on the carpet. “I think such a beautiful story.”
It’s a working date night for NBC’s Al Roker and ABC’s Deborah Roberts, who are covering tonight’s event for their respective networks.
The television news couple, who have been married since 1995, ran into each other on the carpet, both in black top hats.
“I didn’t know you were going to be here!” Roberts said.
Red-hot actor Colman Domingo gave the Met Gala 2025 two different looks that both were head-turners.
Domingo, a co-chair for the night’s event, first entered the event in a royal blue gown-like piece that extended from his shoulder to the floor. Across the shoulders was white lace that stretched to his midsection, a seeming cross between broken angel wings and football shoulder pads.
Colman Domingo shows off two looks Monday night.Getty Images
Later, his look beneath the cloak was revealed: a bold black-and-white blazer, gray trousers with cuffs, a white shirt with a gray pinstriped collar, and a black-and-white polka dot kerchief serving as a necktie. He brought it all together with an oversized black boutonniere with small polka dots.
Yeah, he enjoys this event.
Wearing a custom Valentino suit, Domingo told reporters that he feels “like a king.”
“What I wore originally was sort of like a nod to not only to crossing the seas…,” Domingo said on the carpet. “But also, it was my mother’s favorite color, which is blue. And so, I wanted to tell a story tonight.”
Pharrell Williams, a Met Gala co-chair, said his fashion inspirations for this year’s theme are “the Black men of the working class.”
“They did the hard work, they do the hard work, but then when it’s time to get fresh, they get dandy and super fine,” Williams told Variety. “I’m inspired by the working class because that’s where I come from.”
The musician, who is wearing custom Louis Vuitton, also told reporters that his jacket is made of 15,000 pearls.
Pharrell Williams and Helen Lasichanh attend the 2025 Met Gala.Dimitrios Kambouris / Getty Images for The Met Museum / Vogue
Zendaya, who served as a co-chair of the 2024 Met Gala, is considered a fashion icon. The “Challengers” and “Dune” star last year turned heads with three separate, unique looks for the evening.
Law Roach, Zendaya’s longtime stylist, said they will both be at the event this year. However, he told E!, they are going “separately.”
“We are going to be on the Met Gala steps,” he told the publication last month. “Yes, separately this year.”
“That’s going to be really amazing,” he added. “We’re doing our own thing this year, which is exciting.”
Model Christian Latchman, the face of the Met’s Costume Institute exhibit this spring celebrating Black tailoring, has arrived in a white suit, complete with a flowing train and a pale pink peony on his lapel.
Dia Dipasupil / Getty Images
Latchman is on the cover of the museum’s catalogue this year.
Dancers perform during the 2025 Met Gala’s red carpet entrance. Dia Dipasupil / Getty Images
A collection of impeccably dressed men — dandyism at its finest — took up the legendary stairway to the gala for a performance. During the live feed the group was revealed to be Silk & Sound.
The group was led by Allen René Louis, a composer known for his soulful vocal arrangements.
These men entertained in a pre-gala moment by singing a smooth version of “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough” to an appreciative crowd that seemed unbothered by the rain.
The hosts of Vogue’s livestream have all arrived on the carpet.
Singer and actor Teyana Taylor arrived first, followed by “Saturday Night Live” star Ego Nwodim and producer La La Anthony.
Ego Nwodim attends the 2025 Met Gala.Dimitrios Kambouris / Getty Images for The Met Museum / Vogue
Emma Chamberlain attends the 2025 Met Gala.Dimitrios Kambouris / Getty Images for The Met Museum / Vogue
Emma Chamberlain also arrived on the carpet as a special correspondent.
Costume designer Ruth E. Carter has arrived on the carpet, with elements of a zoot-suit classic high waist and long, sparkly blazer.
Ruth E. Carter attends the 2025 Met Gala.Dimitrios Kambouris / Getty Images for The Met Museum / Vogue
Carter did the costume design for new blockbuster “Sinners,” which is headed toward $250 million worldwide at the box office since its release Easter weekend.
Carter became the first Black costume designer to win an Academy Award for her work on “Black Panther” in 2019. She also worked on “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” released in 2022.
Though the event has sparked conversation and marked evolution in the fashion industry for more than 75 years, the Met Gala has only featured a theme since 1978. The dress code complements each theme, which is determined by the Costume Institute’s annual spring exhibition.
2024: “The Garden of Time”
2023: “Karl Lagerfeld: A Line of Beauty”
2022: “In America: An Anthology of Fashion”
2021: “In America: A Lexicon of Fashion”
2019: “Camp: Notes on Fashion”
2018: “Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination”
2017: “Rei Kawakubo/Comme des Garçons: Art of the In-Between”
2016: “Manus x Machina: Fashion in an Age of Technology”
2015: “China: Through the Looking Glass”
2014: “Charles James: Beyond Fashion”
2013: “Punk: Chaos to Couture”
2012: “Schiaparelli and Prada: Impossible Conversations”
2011: “Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty”
2010: “American Woman: Fashioning a National Identity”
Domingo, a co-chair of the gala, told Vogue that he met with Monica L. Miller, guest curator of the Costume Institute’s “Superfine: Tailoring Black Style” exhibition, to prepare for this year.
Seeing Black mannequins moved him, he said, telling the publication: “I am a Black man who loves style, loves tailoring, and it struck me that I had never seen images like that—of myself, saying, I belong in these clothes. I always had to look for a vision outside of myself.”
While the Met Gala is not a political event, celebrity stylist Avon Dorsey said it — intentionally or not — is making a statement about the power and necessity of diversity, equity and inclusion, a set of practices the Trump administration has weaponized by deeming them “illegal.”
“It is something that comes to mind, because the Met Gala has these themes that emphasizes all three of those touch points of DEI,” said Dorsey, who has dressed A-list talent including Michael B. Jordan, Winston Duke and Jay Ellis. “To highlight the importance of Black culture, specifically Black men, is something that’s needed in the world to stand up against the stereotypes and misinformation and push forward our reality.”
Dapper Dan, a fashion icon in Harlem who grew up underprivileged, said dressing up in clothes purchased from Goodwill was his first introduction to the power of dandyism.
“Even if the clothes weren’t mine, nobody knew how poor my family was,” he said in a Vogue video. “And for me, that was the birth of dandyism, because I saw the power of transformation that could take place with your clothes.”
Deep blues and daffodils replace the typical red carpet color at this year’s Met Gala, with accentuating walls of daffodils lining the walkway itself.
Internet sleuths had guessed that the secret carpet color would be blue, posting their theories on X ahead of tonight’s event.
By 4:30 p.m., the speculation was confirmed as some early arrivals were photographed posing in front of the steps.
Teyana Taylor attends the 2025 Met Gala.Dimitrios Kambouris / Getty Images for The Met Museum / Vogue
Zuri Hall attends the 2025 Met Gala.Dimitrios Kambouris / Getty Images for The Met Museum / Vogue
Deborah Roberts attends the 2025 Met Gala.Dia Dipasupil / Getty Images
By the time celebrities are to begin strutting their elegance into the Met tonight, they may need to watch their steps. Following a full day of rain, it will likely continue through the evening, with accumulation of up to a half inch, according to NBC New York.
Even with conditions less than ideal, celebrities customarily arrive by car and the red carpet — which is actually blue this year — will be covered, probably keeping the parade of fashion icons dry.
Al Roker is taking on a stylish new assignment at the Met Gala, setting foot on the iconic steps as he fills in for Sheinelle Jones’ red-carpet coverage.
Every year, The Carlyle and The Mark Hotel become the go-to spots for celebrities as they get ready for the Met Gala. Both are located on the Upper East Side. Fans and photographers often gather outside the spots to catch the first glimpses of stars in their themed attire.
Michel Heredia, the director of sales and marketing at The Mark, told Women’s Wear Daily that the hotel begins preparations a year in advance.
“The day after, we always get together and see what we did right, what we did wrong and we go over it to make it even better for next year,” he told the publication.
This year’s gala raised a record $31 million before the doors even opened, museum CEO Max Hollein announced at a press preview this morning, according to The New York Times.
This is the first time the event has surpassed $30 million in its 77 years, breaking last year’s record of $26 million.
Hollein said the gala serves as an opportunity for “an environment of celebration, of support, and of meaning,” the Times reported.
The 2025 host committee features:
- André 3000
- Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
- Jordan Casteel
- Dapper Dan
- Doechii
- Ayo Edebiri
- Edward Enninful
- Jeremy O. Harris
- Branden Jacobs-Jenkins
- Rashid Johnson
- Spike Lee and Tonya Lewis Lee
- Audra McDonald
- Janelle Monáe
- Jeremy Pope
- Angel Reese
- Sha’Carri Richardson
- Tyla
- Usher
- Kara Walker
A$AP Rocky, Anna Wintour, Pharrell Williams.Getty Images
Vogue Editor-in-Chief Anna Wintour has chaired the gala since the 1990s.
This year’s co-chairs include: actor Colman Domingo, musicians Pharrell Williams and A$AP Rocky, and Formula One competitor Lewis Hamilton.
For the first time at the glamorous Met Gala in New York, Black men — their style, expression, elegance, creativity and versatility — will be on full display. Using as inspiration the 2009 bestselling book “Slaves to Fashion: Black Dandyism and the Styling of Black Disasporic Identity,” by Monica L. Miller, tonight’s theme, “Superfine: Tailoring Black Style,” opens the door for Black men to demonstrate their versatile and globally influential fashion sense on the red carpet during fashion’s big night.
This year’s gala brings Black dandyism into focus.Justine Goode / NBC News; Getty Images
“Black style is really related to thinking about how fashion and power connect,” Miller said in a YouTube video about making Vogue’s Met Gala issue. “The way that people are styled or fashioned or fashioned themselves in response to the degree of agency that they feel.”
Miller, who curated the Costume Institute’s spring exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, is bringing Black dandyism into focus. Black dandyism, which reaches at least as far back as the Harlem Renaissance from 1918 to the mid-1930s, celebrated life in times that were not socially or politically celebratory for Black people.
Tickets to the Met Gala are a whopping $75,000, with tables of 10 priced at $350,000.
Celebrities who make the coveted guest list are invited by high-profile brands who purchase entire tables at the event. This year’s sponsors include Louis Vuitton, Instagram, Africa Fashion International, Tyler Perry and Condé Nast.
Money from the sales goes toward funding the Costume Institute’s yearly budget, according to The New York Times.
LeBron James, an honorary chair of the gala, said he will not be attending tonight due to a knee injury he sustained at the end of the season.
The Los Angeles Lakers star said his wife, Savannah James, will still be attending in his absence.
“Hate to miss an historical event!” the NBA icon posted on X today. “My beautiful powerful Queen will be there holding the castle down as she always has done!”
While the gala itself is strictly off-limits to the press (attendees must abide by a no-phone policy), the event is most famous for its red carpet, which can be watched via livestream on Vogue.com, YouTube or E!.
This year, singer and actor Teyana Taylor, actor and producer La La Anthony and “Saturday Night Live” star Ego Nwodim will host the Met Gala livestream for Vogue. Emma Chamberlain will be a special correspondent.
Expect to see a slew of memes, hot takes and outfit reviews populate social media platforms such as X, TikTok and Instagram all evening.
The entire night will focus on celebrating Black culture. Watch more in the “TODAY” segment.
Guest arrivals are scheduled from 5:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. ET, but some celebrities may show up fashionably late.
