A look inside the Costume Institute’s Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion

On a humid morning on the first Monday in May in New York City, throngs of characters buzzed around the entrance to the Metropolitan Museum of Art as early as 9 a.m. — more than eight hours before the Met Gala that evening. The audience was there hoping to spot some A-stars. But before the gala, the morning preview of the Costume Institute’s new exhibit “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion,” on which the Met Gala theme is based, was the main star of the show. Editors, friends of The Met and designers such as Thom Browne and Hillary Taymour of Collina Strada signed up to be the first to view the new interactive exhibition.

“Walking through this exhibition, you realized that what I do as a designer is historically important,” Jonathan Anderson, whose fashion label Loewe is a sponsor of the event, told curator Andrew Bolton during the opening speech. “This exhibition smells different, looks different, it’s just magical.”

Comprised of approximately 250 items from the Costume Institute’s permanent collection, the show includes 15 items that are extraordinary and incredibly delicate, too fragile to be worn (these are the exhibition’s “Sleeping Beauty”), while the underlying theme of the entire show is about nature and the inherent dynamics of vulnerability.

Some of the exhibits date back almost 400 years. Many of the ‘sleeping beauties’ lie flat in shiny glass cages to show how vulnerable they really are. a dress à la française from the mid-18th century is positioned next to a contemporary white Prada jacket covered in abstract scarlet blossoms, while a kaleidoscopic disco ball of a Connor Ives dress glitters in the distance. But seeing fashion from such different time periods doesn’t feel scattered on “Sleeping Beauties.” In fact, the organization of the pieces provides context.

“Fashion is a living art form that requires most of our senses for full appreciation and understanding,” Bolton said — an idea central to “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion.” This could be the Costume Institute’s first exhibit where guests are encouraged to touch a textured clothing model and its matching wall. Elsewhere, ‘fragrance artist’ Sissel Tolaas extracted molecules from 57 different garments in the show for a multi-sensory experience. Plastic tubes hang on the walls, where guests can smell the scents of the dresses and their wearers (sweat, hairspray, perfume and so on).

Organized by nature themes related to land, sea and sky, there are Alexander McQueen rarities including the Sarah Burton-designed Butterfly Dress from Spring/Summer 2011 and the Razor Blade Dress from Spring/Summer 2001 (highlighted in the exhibition with the sound of the dress in movement). While the show made a point of placing delicate pieces behind glass, it didn’t really address the question of when fashion should be placed in a museum, nor the ethics of wearing fragile, historic garments. (For example, Kim Kardashian revived that conversation when she wore Marilyn Monroe’s dress on the Met Gala red carpet in 2022.)

The floral fantasies and nature feats in fashion were dreamy. And playful objects such as Elsa Schiaparelli’s famous insect necklace and Undercover’s light-up dress full of flowers were inspiring. Rare creations from Christian Dior and Lanvin also made the show fun. A Loewe jacket with grass growing out of it and a sea of ​​vintage hats under a glass tube were some of the other enchanting objects on display. This exhibition proves that nature has a constant influence on fashion – and that the fragility of wearable objects will always remain a subject of fascination.