Meet the new and improved Met Gala.
Famed for being fashion's biggest night, the annual Met Gala returns with a star-studded roster of hosts and invitees after being canceled last year due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. Now that it's back, the event has been adjusted to reflect modern times.
Oscar nominee Timothée Chalamet, Grammy winner Billie Eilish, tennis star Naomi Osaka and poet Amanda Gorman are the official Met Gala co-chairs, with designer and director Tom Ford, head of Instagram Adam Mosseri and Vogue Editor-in-Chief Anna Wintour serving as honorary chairs.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York called the Met Gala return a "more intimate" gathering per a press statement, making the most exclusive event of the year somehow even harder to get into. With rumblings of who will be invited—the usual slew of A-listers like Beyoncé and Kim Kardashian are expected, but so are new faces like TikTok sensation Addison Rae—the Met Gala seems to be aiming for a younger audience this year.
Of course, fans can also look forward to the annual guessing game of which designers will have OMG moments on the red carpet.
The famous fashion-forward evening takes place on Monday, Sept. 13, to mark the opening of new exhibit "In America: A Lexicon of Fashion" in the Anna Wintour Costume Center. Audiences can expect to tour a fictional American house, with each room featuring examples of 20th- and 21st-century fashion that reflects "the customs and behaviors of the imagined occupants" and focus on a different emotion, per the official release.
"Designs by pioneers of American sportswear will be displayed alongside works by a diverse group of contemporary designers," the press statement continued, "to illustrate a shifting emphasis in American fashion defined by feelings of fear, delight, comfort, anxiety, well-being, loneliness, happiness, belonging, self-reflection, and self-representation among other qualities."
So, what else do we know about the 2021 Met Gala so far? Let's just say there are plenty of shake-ups under way. Keep scrolling to see how the Met Gala is new and improved after a year away.