The Met gala is known as the Oscars of the East Coast. It’s the Super Bowl of style and fashion’s biggest night, and every year the paparazzi flanking both sides of the red—or pink, depending on the theme—carpet are a testament to the boldface names in attendance.
It’s a big night for New York, and major celebrities clamor for invitations, but when Brandon Stanton, aka Humans of New York (HONY), agrees to come inside and photograph some of the attendees, it’s always with mixed feelings. These are not his people. He’s known for documenting the lives of everyday New Yorkers after all, not the glitterati. That said, with two New York Times best sellers under his belt, 10.2 million Instagram followers, and almost 18 million Facebook likes, he has one of the largest and most-engaged fan bases going and is about as NYC as it comes. He also has a way of pulling meaningful quotes out of his subjects, whether they’re standing in the midst of a bustling city or at a cocktail party. In the same mild manner in which he approaches strangers on the street, every year Stanton has photographed the Met—since 2014—he has managed to extract thoughtful, revealing quotes that speak to gala guests’ love lives, habits, and fears.
It’s often said that New York is a city of high highs and low lows. As the epicenter of the COVID-19 crisis, it’s undoubtedly struggling right now, and the city’s attempts to prevent the spread of the illness meant there was no Met gala on the first Monday in May. With all of this in mind, we’re reflecting on some Met gala highs in the hopes that they bring a little much-needed escapism and some hope.
Here, we’ve rounded up some of the most memorable HONY Met gala moments over the years.
