It happens every year: This party is SO big that we don’t realize until the next day that we forgot to put someone on our lists, or didn’t see them at all. I’m sure there are also people missing from THIS, but we are probably at the point where if they’re not here, we thought, “BORING,” and moved on. The most noteworthy item is that Cardi B wore TWO other dresses at the Met other than the one she wore on the red carpet. TWO. This is like… anti-sustainable fashion.
We ALSO have the other half of this year’s big Met Gala intrigue: The Case of the Dueling Violins, starring Olivia Wilde and Vogue China EIC Margaret Zhang (above). Honestly, we don’t usually cover the media folks and we didn’t even SEE Zhang’s originally, but I’m glad we missed it now because we can document more of the mystery. To recap: Gabriela Hearst, who is also in charge of Chloe, attended with three women in gowns recreated from or based on a 1983 Chloe show from Lagerfeld’s tenure. One was Olivia Wilde, in a white violin dress based on a 3/4-length black one originally worn in 2013 by Chloe Sevigny. However, Margaret Zhang, the EIC of Vogue China, ALSO attended in a recreation of this dress. The Internet, of course, acted like they wore identical dresses in BIG FASHION FAUX PAS, etc., but it’s almost a weirder scandale because they DIDN’T technically wear the same dress. There are differences in design, as well as color — and, it seems, in maker. Because no one that I’ve seen has taken ownership of Zhang’s version.
Gabriela Hearst put up one Instagram grid post and approximately two thousand stories from Met Gala night, absolutely none of which acknowledge Margaret Zhang’s existence and many of which are reposts of other people complimenting Olivia’s gown. Olivia, on Tuesday morning, posted a very nice “Hey, great minds! If you have to twin with someone, let it be Margaret Zhang” acknowledgement, and those details in combination tell me that no one in Hearst’s group knew a second violin dress was being made. (I also think if they DID know, they would have posed together.) Ergo, Zhang’s can’t have been from Chloe, unless a) Gabriela Hearst somehow messed up and didn’t think she could admit it, which seems VERY unlikely to me, or b) the person who okayed it did so without talking to Hearst at all, which would be pretty strange. Zhang has no attribution on her Instagram stories and hasn’t put up a grid post; one of our image providers had it credited to Tory Burch, and Zhang did share, in stories, a gallery that the designer Tory Burch put up of the three women who wore her custom dresses. It includes a bonus shot of Zhang hanging out with Liu Wen, and the caption has been edited. The conspiracy theory would be, then, Tory Burch made it on the down-low and someone on her social team didn’t know they weren’t supposed to admit it, and hastily edited the gallery caption to remove a reference to Zhang. But that seems dramatic and weird, too. I have found NO reference to Tory’s involvement from ANYWHERE else, either. So… what the hell? SOMEONE made it. Zhang’s is not the original, and neither is it a dupe of Olivia’s. It did not simply spring up from the earth. But who? And is that person never going to admit it, because perhaps Chloe did not authorize it? Do they even HAVE to authorize it, if it’s an homage? The plot is thick.
And what’s lost in all that, and shouldn’t be, is: They’re both really good gowns.
