Sarah Jessica Parker is ALWAYS a big deal at the Met Gala. She goes almost every year, and she always pays close attention to the theme, to the point where she sometimes looks like she’s wearing a straight-up costume. Which is what happened this year. SJP wore this Chinese-themed custom H&M gown in what looks like black silk, and Refinery29 notes that the gown had a sewn-in sash made from embroidered Chinese silks. There were also red poppies on her gown – poppies with a major trend on the Met Gala red carpet, even though poppies have a complicated history in China.
But the star of SJP’s look – and yes, it’s already a meme – was her Philip Treacy “Flame” headpiece. It’s a reference to the Phoenix headpieces traditionally worn by Chinese brides, plus it may be a larger reference to some Buddhist iconography. Refinery29 says the reaction in China to SJP’s total look has been positive.
Personally, I think she would have looked better without the headpiece, or with a smaller headpiece. I like that SJP goes bold at the Met Gala, and I suspect she does her research and properly explores the theme, but this Treacy headpiece does overwhelm the look.
Oh, and her date was Andy Cohen. Matthew Broderick never comes to these events! She just goes with one of her gay-guy friends for the most part.
Photos courtesy of Getty, WENN.
I think she looks really cool. It’s over the top of course, but the Met Gala is supposed to be! This isn’t the Oscars, the attendees shouldn’t have “pretty” or “sexy” as their main goal.
I agree, this is one of the few events when actresses are quite expected to wear something bombastic (I’d say it’s the musicians that usually get away with more), and she really pulls this look off! I’m sure people aren’t going to forget it anytime soon, too.
Agree. Go Big or Go Home. (Although, personally, I would’ve paired the headdress with a more simple, sleek dress so the focus remains on the OTT head-gear. Like my dressing-up rule: tits OR legs, not both. But that’s just me)
I love love love that hat, Phillip Treacey makes art people!
Loved her boldness, thought it worked.
LOVE IT! The MET is the place to be over the top , and playful.
Exactly. an average Jane like me would look as if I’d raided some sort of priestly closet to play dress-up, but she makes it work.
Yes! She’s always on point and hardly disappoints
I agree, she looks freakin’ amazing. I love that she went balls out, since so few people did
+1 Serious points for the balls this took…although truthfully I’m a greater fan of the headpiece than the dress.
I was hoping someone would wear a headpiece. SJP didn’t let me down with this beauty.
The whole look is great. I think she just stops short of fancy dress. I think the dress would have been better without the red flowers.
I love SJP head peace and her gown, all together the best look of the whole night. She just know how to rock this kind of look, with striking that sertain pose. Well done, Bravo !
Agreed
I always look forward to what SJP wears because she goes all-out. This year was no exception. Bravo!
THANK YOU! She almost won (i given my scalp to Rihanna and Fan Bingbing) BUT This is what it is that you do!!! You Go You make the theme you do extravagant costume! Work!
Yup!
Agree: for this event, in her role especially, do it hard, BE the event. She did it well.
(My 18 yr old niece: “At first I thought she looked like a Madame Alexander doll. but I get it.)
Yes, amazing!
I absolutely LOVE this look. Her eyes are piercing.
I wish she’d change her eye makeup. From far away, all that’s visible is a gray-blue blur and sharp black outlines. Not feelin’ it.
Well, I suppose she made somekind of statement, and
for that I respect her. In my Eyes, she would have
looked much better without the headpiece. . .
Yep…for me, this was one of the worst looks of the night, actually. She’s got wayyyy too much going on with the dress, booties and headpiece!! They are all fighting with each other and your eyes are drawn from one to the other. Nope, to me this looks terribly wrong, sorry.
SJP and Rihanna are usually one of the few that actually commit to the theme every year and i dont necesseraly like this but she obviously put some effort in finding some inspiration in chinese culture, which was the whole point of the theme
I agree. At least she’s wearing something interesting. That’s the idea behind the Met Gala!
don’t like the shoes, don’t like the lips, don’t like the eye make-up…don’t mind the hat!!!!
wait – don’t like the hair!
Agree, the headdress is the least offensive.
Agree on all points.
Agree with just about everything except I like the shoes. I do like that she tried though. Very good sport. I’d invite her to my costume party.
All offensive lol
I have no complaints about her costume – I think it’s over the top, but SJP can definitely pull it off. Her eye-makeup is a totally different subject – looks like she has fake eyes glued to her face!(according to these pics)
The eye make-up bugged me, too, especially with the statement head piece. The eye make-up really aged her and resulted in too much going on. But I love her dedication to fashion – she’s the real deal.
I was waiting for someone to call her eye makeup racist. She clearly was going for a Chinese look.
Her hair is such a fail. Let the headpiece get the attention!
the headdress reminds me more of the “Toukui” headdresses used by Peking opera rather than bridal headdresses. but they look amazing.
My thought exactly — the Peking opera!
It may be fitting to go dramatic for a MET gala, but I still prefer Fan Bingbing’s amazing technicolor cape.
On the other hand, I like it that SJP also wears jade bangles.
Lots of big jade bangles. I want one of them.
I could totally see this in an opera. It is really interesting to look at, that’s for sure.
Well it is a “costume” gala! She’s on point.
Exactly! Most of the people were dressed like they were attending yet another award show in their boring tuxes and dresses. At least she made an effort to pay attention to the theme and that’s a huge plus.
Preach.
And wasn’t the theme china through the looking glass? They were supposed to look over the top. I think she totqlly nailed it.
Brava.
Best dressed for me!
Amazing!!
I kind of liked the dress but that headpiece really overwhelm everything else. Also I hate her make up, why does she always go for pale blue eyeshadow and pink lipstick?? It doesn’t suit her!
Yikes. Disney villain meets showgirl, but this is totally the event at which to do it.
Agree. There is nothing flattering about this outfit or her makeup. But if you’re going to wear a costume, here’s the event.
Fabulous, quirky, inventive, beautiful. I love that she always goes that extra style mile.
Me, too. She puts in a lot of effort.
She needs to stop with all the eye liner.
her eye makeup makes it look like she doesnt have functioning eyes
A costume at the costume gala is exactly what I want to see. This is totally interesting to look at, from many angles, for many minutes.
The only thing I don’t like are the shoes, which look like you can buy them at the mall. They do not belong.
It worked for the theme without being parody but..
all I could hear was “Gordon’s ALIVE?!” which isn’t necessarily a bad thing
(I would also rather this than the ones who turned up with nothing relating to the theme whatsoever. I really wish the theme was an entry prerequisite.)
I actually like the dress but the headpiece is over the top. It looks costumey especially combined with the dress.
Fantastic!!!
SJP makeup makes her look old and tired, her costume is halloweenish. Just no.
Agree. It looks foolish. The hat is wearing her (might have looked better on a model type with a simpler dress); clearly Treacy got his hands on some interesting research and lost perspective. She looks embarrassed (or the hat is compressing her vertebrae). Freaking embarrassment retailer Andy Cohen looks embarrassed.
Agreed. It’s the carnival look, not really an East-meets-West kind of inspirational thing. Matthew didn’t attend, so perhaps that’s why she’s looking rather grumpy in most pics…
I like it, but I would have worn my hair up somehow. Or back. Agree with everyone about the makeup.
She could have brought Matthew and she’d still be bringing a gay guy friend. *rim shot* 😉
The headpiece is a don’t. Tracey was the guy who did the fascinators for the York princesses for Will & Kate’s wedding? Bad call SJP.
I love SJP and I loved her dress, hat and all. I’m surprised poppies were worn given their history in China, so there is the cultural misinterpretation we were discussing yesterday.
I really loved what she did, and I thought it brought something really dynamic to the night and the theme to be inspired by.
I think SJP looks amazing!
She just tries to hard. She is so thirsty for the fashion community to pay attention to her that she’ll wear anything.
This is pathetic. It’s not edgey or forward it’s just thirsty.
I would love to see more of the details on that dress – which is exactly the point of museum textile and fashion exhibits.
Didn’t actually like the dress much, but absolutely love her joie de vivre in going all out drama for this event: love her, and APPRECIATE her look!
I know it’s a costume ball and all, but I’m not feeling “China”. I’m feeling “The Winner of the Medusa Superhero Beauty Pageant”.
Credit to the person who crafted that elaborate headpiece, though; Mad skills.
I am withdrawing my comment. 🙂
Like it or not, she commited to the theme and owned the whole look. She never gave me the impression of being uncomfortable. AND (surprinsingly, very much so), it somehow managed not to be racist.
Lord of Light, that headpiece is just crazy! I’d love to know what blurted out of Andy’s mouth when he first saw it.
The hair should have been up away from the shoulders and face. That was a big mistake. Ruined an otherwise interesting outfit IMO.
I agree.. the big mistake was her hair. She should have put her hair up and pulled back and given the headpiece the real focus it deserved.
AMAZING! That’s all.
I thought the headpiece was perfect for this event.
Flawless.
You guys, I am honest to God, no snark asking- how is this headpiece ok and not “racist” or a”ppropriation”? I feel like people call racism for so much less these days.
I thought people would be freaking out about it
I thought it was interesting to read the Chinese bloggers’ take…
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-32586993
I was dying when they said SJP looks like the Olympic mascot from 2008.
She does look ridiculous, I’m astonished by how many people thought this was awesome.
I’m guessing it’s the influx and ubiquity of Marvel comic movies.
Thank you for noticing….the huge….red….dragon-lady-esque….headpiece on her head?!?! Like did nobody else feel the elephant in the room? Or did they just think complimenting would be safest, surely since SJP is a fashion icon?
Dude I love SJP. But this, and the whole freggin show was cultural appropriation, sh*tty old cliches, and general “asian-opriental-east-something or other” themed. This is not china through the looking glass, and that headpiece is rude AF. Not cool dudes, this is not fashion.
Is a shirtless dude wearing a traditional feathered Native headdress considered racist? What is the difference?
Me too. I’ve seen the crowd here destroy people for way less than this.
At least it’s fun! This years dresses have been a snooze fest
It took awhile for the head piece to grow on me- but you can’t deny SJP gets the spirit of this event. Are the shoes/boots from her own line, and the dress was hers too? Appreciate self promotion, but the two don’t work together!
I love it!
The dress is just meh but the headdress knocked it out of the park.
Perfect for the occasion – it’s a costume gala, not a cheap “let’s shock everyone by wearing a few sparkles and a see-through body stocking” event.
It’s just overkill–too much of everything. Edited a bit, it would have been fabulous.
It’s Japanese. Her headpiece is DragonballZ inspired. It’s animé.
She’s a New York style girl and can pull off extreme, but I do wish someone had been better (kinder?) with her make-up… and that the shoes had been chosen more for proportion & theme in relation to the whole.
Jade jangles for the win; that’s more bohemia Chinatown chic-kitsch at its best. Loved that.
I’ll be the only dissenting opinion. As a Chinese-American I was offended by her dress and hat. I found it cartoonish and culturally ignorant. To take 5000 years of cultural heritage and reduce it to a garish eyesore for the gross and crude opportunity for publicity really bothered me. If she had really done her research she would have known that peonies, chrysanthemums, lotus, jasmine all have greater importance in Chinese culture and art than a poppy. It’s not cultural appropriation. It’s cultural bastardization.
The poppies on her outfit are totally inappropriate. Seriously, those are a big no in China. Fail all around.
I love what she’s wearing but I feel that there is something still amiss. Maybe it’s her hair?
It annoys me that a white woman is wearing that head piece rather than an Asian woman. Wouldn’t you be annoyed if a white woman wears an cultural African American headpiece instead of a black woman? She looks like she’s shriveling up in that headpiece and it does not look elegant on her at all.
She looks so awesome! She never lets me down when it comes to these events. That is what the Met Gala should be like. I would have loved for the dresses to be more like the ones that were used in the exhibition. I loved it. SJP can almost do no wrong in my eyes when it comes to fashion.
I want to know if she wore the headpiece in the cab, or, put it on after exiting the vehicle…
Uh, look up poppies and the Opium War. Poppies are a no no at an event meant to celebrate Chinese culture.
SJP takes her fashion- and herself- pretty seriously but she looks like a total fool here.
The world’s most celebrated fashion victime
Yep, I like SJP’s gown and hat, too. It is bombastic and over-the-top and that is what the MET gala is about. It is basically a costume party for celebrities. Think carneval.
Does she ever appear anywhere with her husband?
Good question! And in my opinion this is way too strange to me …
Ridiculous.