The Who What Wear Podcast: The Met Gala 2026 Recap: Unpacking the Theme, the Art References, and the Best Beauty Moments

0:10Welcome to the Who What Wear podcast. I'm Kat Collings and today Hillary and I are sitting down in the studio to recap the 2026 Met Gala. We recorded right after the red carpet wrapped up and in honor of fashion's biggest night, we're dropping this episode a day early. You're welcome. The dress code was fashion is art, which we saw displayed in full force last night. We're here to dissect everything from the smartest references to the best dressed. And we're also sharing clips sent in by our editor correspondents who are live on the scene. It's all coming up on Who, What, Where.

0:47Hillary Kerr:Okay, Kat, are you ready? Ready as ever. I mean, I'm not ready. I'm still processing the fact that I just started crying in a room full of people when Beyonce walked on the red carpet for the first time in 10 years. I'm embarrassed. I think everyone played it cool. They were like, oh, okay. Not me, not my right eye. No, I mean with your crying. We were like pretending it wasn't happening. Just like a slow tear only on one side. Like I'm Johnny Depp in that 1990s movie. Nevermind, walking that back. So we're sitting down just moments after the Met Gala red carpet awards ended. I have so many thoughts.

1:18Hillary Kerr:I'm sure you have a lot of thoughts too. Plenty. Can we start while it's like incredibly fresh in our minds? What was the most memorable moment for you? Let's elaborate on Beyonce for just a moment because you cried. Like a giant emotional baby. It was really the family of it all that I think was quite touching, right? Showing up with her daughter. But it's also, it's just Beyonce. This is the first time in a decade. Do you remember the last time? No. It felt like a homecoming to see her there again. And it makes me just all kinds of emotional and delighted to see her out and about. Well, that was exciting.

1:52She had about seven attendants just for like her feather train. And then Blue showed up looking really cool, age appropriate. Yes. Mr. Carter looked nice too. Did look nice. Elegant. My biggest like what moment was like double take was Bad Bunny, I have to say. In ye olde face makeup? Yeah, and aged. It was reminding me of like 100 days of school tradition. Yeah, that was interesting. Halloween. Some people have gone Halloween, I think, this year. I love that.

2:18Hillary Kerr:I would rather a Halloween or a bizarre moment a la Heidi Klum, frankly. I would prefer that to all of the tasteful gowns in the world. I like somewhere where it's like in the middle. But if you're going to go tasteful, boring or you're going to go costume, go for the costume. I mean, it was a costume institute. Why not? I love that he looked like an older gentleman. That was an interesting choice. Who else was interesting to you? Ooh, I mean, I feel like we're going to get into it with my top three, but I feel like you have some themes, some trends that you wanted to call out. Yes, I do. So I was really pleasantly surprised and was not expecting the level of veils and masks and headpieces going on, which, again, I love because when do you get to wear those in real life?

3:02Hillary Kerr:Almost never. Almost never. So I say yes to all of that. Katy Perry wearing Stella McCartney and she had like a peephole situation going on. Face guard. It was very fencing adjacent. Don't know what that was about, but I loved it. Gwendolyn Christie had had the face mask as well. There was a lot of veiled, unveiled moments. I loved Sarah Paulson with the dollar veil over her eyes. I loved SZA in a Bodhi headpiece that had flowers and shells hanging from it. Madonna, which also caused me to gasp, which had a very painterly reference. Her entire entourage took up the entire conference. So, you know, they have multiple people kind of going up at different stages, but nobody could pass Madonna.

3:42It was like a ship from the exhibit itself. I was also pleasantly surprised with the body inclusivity that seemed to be super present.

3:48Hillary Kerr:Welcome to 2026, y 'all. We have arrived, I guess. For example, they made a mold of model Erin Rose Phillip for one of the mannequins, which I thought was really cool. That was, you know, surprise and delight. A step in the right direction. Yeah, I'd say so. I think so as well. Okay, so taking a step back and talking about this year's theme, I always get such a kick out of the themes because sometimes they're hyper specific and that yields incredible results that also can yield very poor results. This one was more general. Fashion is art. So according to the press release from the museum, and I shall quote here, the dress code was meant to invite guests to express their own relationship to fashion as an embodied art form and celebrate the countless depictions of the dressed body throughout art history.

4:31Hillary Kerr:Given that, was the red carpet what you expected to see? And did any of your predictions come true? There were a lot of like nail on the head moments. A lot of the statue, body as art, Serena Williams and Marc Jacobs, Hayley Bieber in St. Laurent. So that was kind of like an obvious way to go about it, I think. A lot of vintage runway looks that reference art, of course. And And what I really like about this theme is that you can do a lot of storytelling around it. And you can kind of choose who you highlight with the art you're referencing. One that really stood out to me was Angela Bassett wearing Probable Go-Rong.

5:02Did you see her? I did. Can you tell our audience a little bit about that look? Well, I would love to. She was wearing a look inspired by a painting called Girl in the Pink Dress by Laura Wheeler Waring. She's a woman who depicted Black women across the social spectrum and really disrupted the stereotypes and transcended class norms. I thought that was a really special artist to highlight.

5:21Hillary Kerr:I love that when we were just sitting in a room with a bunch of editors and we were going through all the looks and watching the live stream, I felt like everyone's art history minor was coming out where people were calling out painters and sculptors and references and some of which I knew and some of which I did not. And I love that it made us like go back and delve into it and think about like, oh, what is that Prada reference that Hunter Schaefer is wearing? What piece of art is referenced by Gracie Abrams and Chanel? Like there's so much fun detective work. And I feel like that part of the storytelling, the nerd in me very much enjoys.

5:51It was one of the rare occasions when the liberal arts education was paying off in the fashion world.

5:56Hillary Kerr:It was quite lovely. OK, so on the other hand, what were some of the more unexpected interpretations of the dress code that we saw tonight? One that was more literal, I think, was Sabrina Carpenter. She was wearing kind of like wrapped in film strips from the movie Sabrina. The headpiece that she was wearing with the bejeweled front, like that also references the film because Audrey Hepburn wears a headpiece like that at some point in time. And the dress was Dior. I think she looked incredible. It felt like a very meta commentary on art and film and fashion. Like a walking billboard, but like very subtle, like you had to know.

6:29Hillary Kerr:It's very, if you know, you know. Who else? Lena Dunham. She wore Valentino and her dress was inspired by a blood splatter. Okay. from a 17th century Italian Baroque artist who was female, which at the time there weren't a lot of famous female artists. Her dress was just, you could see the movement. Yes, that was visceral, which I feel like that's the way that Lina writes. If you've read her memoir, Famesic, which I feel like everyone is either listening to or reading right now, she is a very visceral writer. So that would make sense that she would want to go with a visceral look. So let's talk about the designers and the brands that really dominated the Met Gala this year.

7:05Hillary Kerr:Which designers worked really well for this theme and why? I'd say St. Laurent got a lot of credits, but that's not really a surprise because Anthony's a co-chair of the hosting committee this year. Schiaparelli, I think, is perfect for this. Kylie Jenner. Perfect for the Met Gala always. There's always something fancy, like interesting, wild, creative, artistic. What the heck is going on? I mean, it's surreal. Right. Literally can work for so many different things. Kylie Jenner's look, inspired by Venus de Milo, was kind of like a paper doll fantasy. see. And that felt very suited, I think, to the theme.

7:35Hillary Kerr:Yes. I also really love Emma Chamberlain's, which was also probably one of my favorite looks for the night. She's wearing custom Mugler and worked with an artist who actually hand painted the gown itself. 30 different colors. It took over 40 hours and it looks like a piece of abstract art that had been sort of poured onto her body. She always does something interesting. I love all of her work with her stylist, Jared Elner. I just think they are a perfect pairing and she always takes really interesting risks. And I just thought this was unexpected and painterly and beautiful and colorful. I appreciate that she came out early too.

8:11I was like, great, we're starting off with the bang.

8:13Hillary Kerr:Yes, yes, indeed. So this is also a night when stylists work overtime. I always get such a kick out of seeing their social media followings when you'll see like they're prepping for all of these different clients and they have lots of different looks. And then every single look also has an after party look. Was there a standout stylist, in your opinion, for tonight? So I think we saw a smattering of standout looks across like our usual suspect celebrity stylists. Jared Elner, as you mentioned, Sabrina and Emma Chamberlain. Danielle Goldberg also dressed. Carrie, Ayo, Zoe, and that is a pretty stacked group of girls.

8:46That's a trifecta. That's a hat trick.

8:48Hillary Kerr:That's as good as it gets. Carly Welch did Olivia Wilde and Sarah Paulson, who had some really interesting looks. Lady P always does something amazing for the Met Gala. She does something more intellectual and something that I feel like pushes things a little bit more. I think that that is such a dynamic cerebral pairing, those two. Yeah, there's always maybe even a little bit of like cultural commentary. She has the dollar bill mask and I could take a guess about what that was aimed at. Perhaps one percent. Law Roach, who is a stylist, but also sort of a celebrity in his own right. I just loved his engagement ring.

9:21He debuted it on the red carpet and blinded by this rock, this meteor, really. House he deserves.

9:30Hillary Kerr:Yes. One of the things I also always love to look at are the newcomers, the newbies to the Met Gala. Connor Story, for sure. Yes. That was his first time. My favorite was Stevie Nicks was there for the first time ever, which feels incredible, wearing Zara by John Galliano and Tiffany jewelry. She had a great hat. We had a fair amount of chapeaus, like really thoughtful, pronounced, interesting. Dochi had one. Yes, yes. I love that one by Mike Jacobs. Sierra had like, hers was more crown-like. But I love Madonna and her ship situation. Yes. But Stevie Nicks, I mean, she can do no wrong as far as I'm concerned.

10:05Hillary Kerr:And I will not hear otherwise. And that's kind of a surprise. Like you don't expect to see her. I did not. To return to Connor's story for a minute in St. Laurent, I thought it was interesting. There's an Instagram account called Data But Make It Fashion, run by a woman who's one of our editors in residence. She did sort of an analysis of online sentiment of which looks were the most popular, you know, the most talked about on social media. And number one was Conor. Really? Yeah. Do you think that's because he has a rabid fan base? Yes. But he beat out regulars like Janelle Monae, Hailey Bieber.

10:36Hillary Kerr:I'm sorry. That must have been recorded before Beyonce hit. Yes, I think it was. It was. It was published before Beyonce hit. I refuse to believe otherwise. Beyonce cannot be put in a category with anyone else. So pre-Biancé, it was Conor who stole the show. Yeah, great job, James, who is his stylist. Okay, I love that. I also want to talk about the glam. So last year, our whole team was obsessing over the Vuitton logo that was expertly stamped on Dochi's cheek. Did you have any favorite beauty moments? Honestly, so many. The beauty is as exciting to me as the fashion. I loved Paloma El Cesar's bejeweled ear.

11:12I don't know what made me think. I don't know what the exact reference was, but it made me think of like Vincent van Gogh's ear. I feel like there's been some famous ear shots, like Girl with a Pearl Earring. Hunter Schaefer, I think, had a wonderful, like, you could be inspired in real life by it, Beauty. She had the barely there blue highlights, the side part blow out, a wash of blue on her eyes. Like, it felt very realistic and kind of like 80s. I was very into it.

11:32Hillary Kerr:Any for you? Can we talk about Hudson Williams? He had a not something I would wear in every day, but still loved look. Very dramatic eyeshadow inspired by Black Swan. I loved that. I was also surprised to see we saw some bleached eyebrows again. It's like Kylie Jenner, her eyebrows, you and I were talking about this earlier, getting a real workout. They were bleached on the cover of Vanity Fair and then they were dyed dark again. I think she's done it a couple of times since. It is a shortcut to a more high fashion, more avant-garde look. Like you want to look otherworldly, may the eyebrows be gone.

12:05Hillary Kerr:Bleach the brow. Yeah. I was just going to say that exact thing. Okay, so speaking of the finer details, were there any other accessories or subtle styling choices that people might have missed upon first glance, but that really added to the overall look in which they can probably go to who what wear and see those looks in detail right now? Hopefully that's going live as we speak. Oh, it is live, baby. We have some fun stats. I know you love a stat. I do. Margot Robbie and Chanel. Her look took 761 hours to complete. And she had this train. I know. Lined with flower petals that were embroidered.

12:38And it took over a thousand individual pieces of embroidery. She hadn't attended in three years. So this was kind of fun to see her back on the scene. Kylie's look. Guess how many hours her skirt took? The pearl detailing on her skirt. 100. Thank you for underdoing it because it took 11 ,000 hours. 11 ,000? Isn't that insane? Oh, my God. Like, it sounds fake, but I don't know. That's wild. There were a couple of women who did. The nails were done, but then the whole hand kind of was dipped in color. Tessa Thompson in like an Eves Klein blue. And Ashley Graham had that, too, with like a silvery sparkle moment.

13:13I love that.

13:14Hillary Kerr:It feels like someone has like actually like put their hand into a vat of paint. Yes. I mean, that's startling and interesting and artistic and messy. I love everything about that. We also have to talk about Rihanna, who, of course, I believe is the last person to actually hit the red carpet, which feels wild because I always thought that would be Beyonce. But what did you think? I think she looks like she fell out of a cloud in heaven. I adore her and everything she does. And I love that she makes us wait because we will. For the folks at home who don't know, we had editors on the ground at the Carlisle, the Surrey, and the Mark Hotels, as well as the red carpet.

13:48Hillary Kerr:So let's take a look at some of the behind-the-scenes clips that they sent. First, let's see some of the odd things that happened outside the hotels. There was a robot outside the Mark Hotel. There were mannequins, vacuum cleaners, and leaf blowers outside the Carlisle. There was also a sketch artist outside of the Carlisle drawing sketches as celebrities left the building. Okay. Craziness. I have to get this off my chest. So I do not feel like we get enough credit at Who What Where for being the pioneers in setting up shop. and I will explain why that's happened. We have been covering the Met Gala for almost 20 years when no other fashion brand or media outlet was covering it because it was Vogue's baby and you weren't supposed to cover another brand's thing.

14:35Hillary Kerr:And there was so much hoopla about that, but we thought it was interesting and we started covering it. No one wanted to give us best access because we were just this upstart digital publisher. And then as time went on, we decided to figure out other ways to get access if we weren't getting proper access on the red carpet. So we started sending editors to the hotels where the celebrities were getting dressed, to the Carlisle, to the Surrey, to the Mark, setting up a shop outside, getting some of those first looks, scooping everyone. That started about five years ago. And then every other major media brand has started doing this.

15:08Hillary Kerr:And I think it provides a richer experience for our audience. I love it. And it feels a little bit naughty and I don't mind. Yes. We have permission to be at those hotels. We are not trespassing, just saying. Sometimes you get to see the really fun, like celebrities, like covered in a box or covered in umbrellas. They're trying to hide the look. And sometimes you get to see the look. And so we get to have the first look really at a lot of the debut moments. I think it's fun because you also get to see it in motion in a whole different way. I love it. So Erin Fitzpatrick from our team was actually on the red carpet this year for the first time ever.

15:40Hillary Kerr:And she shared something interesting about the setup. Let's take a look. Hi, it's Erin. I'm at the Met Gala red carpet reporting for Who What Where. One thing that surprises me being here IRL is that the street down below is open to normal traffic. I've seen lots of bicyclists, rollerbladers, lots of taxis. New York does not stop for the Met Gala. Our social editor, Debra Yu, was posted up at the Surrey. Let's hear who she saw leaving the hotel. We just finished at the Surrey. Kendall Jenner was here. Hayley Bieber was here. Rachel Sennett was here. We were weighing. So much fun. Hayley! Hayley!

16:21Who at Wear some high? Hayley!

16:25Hillary Kerr:I love that I could hear her talking in some of the clips. She's like, Who at Wear loves you? Chase Wee-Wenders is like, oh, I love you guys too. Debra's bold and I really love it about her. I know. She's a good one. She also saw Emily Blunt and Stanley Tucci leave the Surrey together on a party bus with The Rock. So that pretty much, I think she can quit. And she's peaked. That's amazing. So Kat Collings, of all of the looks that you saw tonight, who is in your top three? And more specifically, who is your number one best dressed? Dree Hemingway stood out to me. Picasso, Picasso, Picasso. Yes, and Valentino Couture, Pandora Jewelry.

17:02I just, I like that she went there. It wasn't sexy. I thought she looked fabulous and went for it.

17:08Hillary Kerr:She feels like an art history student. I have no idea what her background is, but it feels like she would know these things. She's almost like Gwendolyn Christie's more accessible cousin, which I appreciate that. Second, I will say Zoe Kravitz will be my ultimate girl crush. She's our overlap. Forever. I think Zoe Kravitz is everyone's overlap. Yeah. Great. She wore a lace St. Laura. Not many people can wear something so simple and then be best dressed. And it is sculptural, right? Like it stood away from the body and had like a sculptural element to it. It's not just a black lace dress. And her hair lately, I feel like she's been doing really forward things with her bangs.

17:43Hillary Kerr:She'll have a micro. She'll have a side. She'll have a thick fringe. She'll have a curly. She does it all. My third, which I think we will maybe not have overlap, is I love Carrie Mulligan in vintage Prada. Oh. It was a 1998 print. And it was simple. It wasn't the start, the flashiest moment ever. But the print was just, it was geometric and it was just cool. And the cut was cool. And I was like, okay. Yes. You know? Yeah, I get that. I get that. So we have one overlap. Zoe, okay. Yes. And then for me, I, again, I'm going back to Emma Chamberlain. I love a colorful moment for the runway. And I love the handicraft moment of it, the craftsmanship, the using an actual artist in the construction.

18:26Hillary Kerr:To me, there's just something really exciting about that. It's literal art on literal fashion. literally so i love that and then for my third i mean like look i personally feel like we would be selling all of ourselves short by not saying beyonce because she is beyonce she wore like a skeleton bejeweled feather train drama and impact 10 out of 10 she she won she's beyonce i have to say i also really love sabrina's look it was unexpected it was a different take on art compared to the more traditional like sculptural moments or painterly moments, but film is art too. And I did find that interesting and self-referential and also a little tongue in cheek, which is something that she is so good at and I get a real kick out of.