At every Met Gala, there tends to be one outfit that incites more discussion than all the rest. This year, it wasn’t Madonna’s sweeping Saint Laurent gown and haunted ghost ship hat. It wasn’t Janelle Monáe’s Ethernet cable collar. It was, in fact, the model and British Vogue cover girl Bhavitha Mandava’s Chanel look – jeans and a quarter zip – that got people talking the most. “I think some things aren’t meant to be understood, they’re meant to be felt,” Mandava told Vogue of the outfit, which referenced her now legendary discovery story. “I wasn’t trying to be seen that morning. I was just existing. And somehow that was enough.”
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While some commentators found the look too pedestrian for the occasion, with a particular focus on the fact she was – gasp – wearing jeans on the red carpet, such critiques arguably ignore the backdrop of how such an outfit came to be. “Those who have followed the swift yet expansive development of Matthieu Blazy’s creative vernacular at Chanel will have noticed that the ‘humdrum’ look was actually rendered in the same featherlight material palette as his haute couture debut,” notes British Vogue’s fashion and style editor Mahoro Seward. “They’ll also know that the knowing reframing of luxury through the prism of the everyday is something of a knack of his.”
Mandava’s Met Gala look aside, jeans have actually long been a fixture on the red carpet. From Hollywood premieres to blockbuster award ceremonies, some of the coolest and most memorable looks on the red carpet have involved jeans – particularly in the ’90s and ’00s, back when relaxed style ruled (if you think Mandava’s outfit was “shocking”, cast your eyes across all the battered Converse and lit cigarettes on red carpets circa 1995). To that end, to celebrate experimentation in all of its forms, here’s every time a celeb wore jeans on the red carpet and nailed it.