Content Warning: This article contains a discussion of enslavement. 

Announced in October, ‘Superfine: Tailoring Black Style’ takes black dandyism at its core to explore the importance of fashion and self-expression in African American diasporic identity. The Costume Institute’s 2025 exhibition will explore the figuration of the black dandy and the transhistorical emergence of the theme through the 18th century into the contemporary. 

The institution was inspired by Monica L. Miller’s exploration into the root of Black Dandyism in her 2009 novel Slaves to Fashion: Black Dandyism and the Styling of Black Diasporic Identity. Adjectively, ‘Dandy’ is an archaic term to describe ‘a man […] who dressed in expensive, fashionable clothes and was very interested in his appearance’. Miller identifies the root of the embodiment of black self-expression in the 18th century as fashionably dressed servants, or slaves. Dandyism offered Black men an opportunity to utilise fashion to destabilise black masculinity and reconstruct a new identity. A review written by Shari Perkins brings light to the dialectical process of ‘black slaves into black selves’, studying the idea of a self-conscious manipulation, or reclamation, of authority as a form of self-expression. 

Destabilize black masculinity and reconstruct a new identity

Although the specific theme for the red-carpet exhibition will not be released until closer to the time, the exploration of sartorial black dandyism reflects broader political and cultural issues of power and race. In a not yet stately conscious right-wing America, having the spotlight on cultural nationalism seems suitable, as we explore black cosmopolitanism through visual art. Since the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement, the Institute have focused on neglected American Fashion narratives through time, thus crafting an inclusive arc into the realm of contemporary fashion. 

Given the focus on masculine sartorial fashion, the exhibition will be the first to focus exclusively on menswear since 2003’s ‘Men in Skirts’. The reframing of our understanding of American modernistic fashion creates this renaissance for men’s clothing, in a time where contemporary depictions of dandyism propose ‘new ways of fashioning political and social possibility in the black Atlantic world’, according to Miller. The all black-male co-chair lineup for the Met Gala is nothing short of iconic, featuring the likes of Pharrell Williams, A$AP Rocky, Lewis Hamilton, and Colman Domingo, with LeBron James serving as an honorary chair. A$AP Rocky is prominent in encapsulating ‘pure dandy extravagance’, considering his previous red-carpet outfits – his 2023 look featured a ‘stacked Gucci belts and diamanté-studded jeans’ underneath a plaid kilt, all designed by Gucci. The reasoning behind the decision to make such cultural icons the co-chairs is simply explained by Monica L. Miller herself: ‘The contemporary designers that are in the show are there because many of them talk about and use the history that we’re recounting as part of their design philosophies’.

The exhibition will be the first to focus exclusively on menswear since 2003

The Costume Institute curator Andrew Bolton has remarked on his hopes for the embrace of ‘the whole cross section of Dandyism’, in response to the speculation that the scrutinized entrance of white celebrities will be daunting. The idea of ‘Superfine’ may weigh in on a heavy juxtaposition in its developmental meaning, but Miller herself has commented on how Dandyism itself is a ‘vehicle through which one can manipulate relationships’, where the development of the American Fashion narrative can actively be contributed to.

On the topic of contributing to the topic of ‘Superfine: Tailoring Black Style’ as an expression of menswear, women are obviously not excluded from the realm of sartorial dandyism. If we are to view women’s clothing and men’s clothing through the concept of duality (disregarding androgyny) throughout history, then it is easy to accept that women’s fashion takes inspiration from men’s fashion in the simplest sense, while men’s clothing inherently does not take inspiration from women’s clothing. The Met Museum reported on this regarding their 2003 ‘Men in Skirts’ exhibition, noting that ‘nowhere is this asymmetry more apparent than in the taboo surrounding men in skirts’. When it comes to the concept of sartorial fashion today, the line between women and men’s clothing is more blurred than ever, with the alternative becoming the norm for the future of American fashion. The Met Museum goes on to suggest that ‘by promoting the skirt as an item of utopian wardrobe, these designers present the skirt as a hypothetical ideal’. In a time where ‘Superfine’ is attempting to explore the emergence of Black Dandyism from the 18th century to the black cosmopolitanism of the 21st century, it makes sense to expect a subversion of conventionality in gendered clothing to introduce this inclusivity of contemporary fashion. 

The line between women and men’s clothing is more blurred than ever

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