The parallels with the Gilded Age are poignant. Vanderbilt was a poser (in the aesthetic sense) and used that to leverage the media. Kardashian has done the same; she is an expert in buzz. Tonight Adam Mosseri, the Head of Instagram, the new influential media, is an honorary chair next to Wintour and Tom Ford. Instagram is cutting a big check in support of both exhibition and party. It is on this platform that images will swirl and new hierarchies will be confirmed.
So who will triumph? It could be a big night for the Beckhams. It would be the perfect society debut for Romeo Beckham and new girlfriend Mia Reagan. Heiress Nicola Peltz took Brooklyn to his first Met Gala last year, saying, ‘I’m trying to make him American at the moment.’ Tonight might be their debut as a married couple.
Brooklyn Beckham and Nicola Peltz attend The 2021 Met Gala
Mike Coppola/Getty Images
And there’s often a strong political and Royal contingent. None more written about than Diana, Princess of Wales’ 1995 attendance in lacy Dior; one of her last events before her death. Princesses Marie-Chantal and Olympia of Greece, Charlotte Casiraghi, Queen Rania of Jordan and Princess Elisabeth von Thurn und Taxis have all been tempted by the status of the Met.
The gala, as a history, illustrates the slow but ever changing rank of society — the new incomers, the missing outgoers and those treading the gilded tightrope somewhere in between.
