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Four months ago, a text from Grace Wales Bonner popped up on FKA Twigs’s phone: “Wanna come to the Met with me?” The invitation couldn’t have come from a more fitting host: The 2025 Met Gala celebrates, after all, the unveiling of “Superfine: Tailoring Black Style,” the Costume Institute’s exhibition based on Monica L Miller’s research into Black dandyism, a subject in which few modern designers are as immersed. “I read Monica’s book, Slaves to Fashion, while I was studying,” Wales Bonner says, a couple of days before the event. “And it’s been 10 years since then, so it’s a full circle moment for that body of work to be acknowledged. The show feels like a celebration of everything that is important to me: elegance, refinement, the idea of embodied clothing and its power to transform.”
Wales Bonner makes her debut on the steps of the Metropolitan Museum of Art this evening alongside Jeff Goldblum, Tyler Mitchell, Eric N. Mack, Omar Apollo and, of course, Twigs, who didn’t hesitate to respond to Wales Bonner s message with a “yes.”
“I made clothing for Twigs quite early on in our careers, so we’ve known each other for a long time,” says Wales Bonner. “She’s so eloquent in the way she talks about the way she carries herself in the world, and I find her ease of physicality so inspiring.” While the duo could have drawn from any number of the Black aesthetes-about-town whom Wales Bonner has previously cited as inspiration—James Baldwin, Langston Hughes, Sun Ra, Haile Selassie—it was the 1920s dancer Josephine Baker who informed tonight’s look: a deco, feather-trimmed cocktail dress of Swarovksi-scalloped organza, with a silk chiffon stole and custom Manolo Blahniks.
Along with doing a lot of things differently, Twigs kept one thing the same when it came to preparing for the 2025 Met Gala: her skincare. “I’ve been wearing eye cream since I was 11 years old,” she says, “because of my mum.” In the hours preceding the event, she doubled down on her routine, working with makeup artist Kabuki to create a base that would nourish her skin and, crucially, last all night. “Augustinus Bader was introduced into my life during a transformational period a couple [of] years ago,” she shares, noting that she made the shift to using products to help with skin hydration, amongst other things. Her preparation process included using the brand’s The Rich Eye Cream before applying any makeup. “Twigs shared three words with me when it came to her beauty,” Kabuki shares: “Healthy, gorgeous skin.” With this guiding phrase in mind, he used taupes and browns to create something that’s a little bit punk but still artistic and simple, paired with a dewy, luminous base.
“When you think of dandyism, you think of tailoring,” says Twigs, now sporting an ultra-short Eton crop for the occasion. “But I thought it would be an interesting challenge to subvert the suiting that Grace does so well. Josephine, like Eartha Kitt and Grace Jones, is the epitome of female dandyism.” Born in segregated Missouri in 1906, Baker was, by the time she fled to Paris in her 20s, the most celebrated cabaret artist of the Jazz Age, clowning against racist stereotypes in feathered loincloths and banana skirts onstage while strolling around with a pet cheetah on a diamond leash offstage. “The perfect ingredient to all great art is an element of ‘stink’,” Twigs adds. “That’s what Josephine had: an attitude which attracted and repelled. There’s space for glory and outrage, and that, I think, is what being a dandy is all about: Having the confidence to stand there and trigger and enlighten and confuse and amaze through style. There is no diamond that could have outshone the one inside Josephine’s chest.”
It’s a line that might have resonated with a younger version of Twigs, back when she was still on the dance competition circuit. “Show me sequins and a can of L’Oréal Elnett, and I’ll start foaming at the mouth,” she says with a laugh. “I did ask the team to remove any sequins from the fabric of the dress—if not, I’ll go on a rampage.” Her other requests: a collarbone-freeing neckline and a palette that continued the earthy nudes of Eusexua. “Because even Josephine’s most flamboyant looks felt ‘of the earth’, grounded.” But is being grounded at the Met Gala–the world’s most photographed red carpet–not a contradiction in terms? “I was terrified the first few times I went,” Twigs says. “But I’m in my element these days. Imagine: loads of really famous people–who I promise are just normal humans–wandering around without their teams for once. It’s like that TV show where nursery kids are filmed with hidden cameras, trying to socialize–except you’re between Donatella Versace and Lady Gaga.” And who is she most looking forward to seeing tonight? “I wonder if John Galliano’s going?” she says. “I always love saying hi to Galliano.”
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