There were high fashion hijabs, towering hair pieces, stilettos and chunky boots. Ball gowns, feather collars — both handmade and bespoke.
All the elements came correct for the fifth annual Chicago Does the Met Gala thrown by the Chicago Fashion Coalition in a Streeterville event venue and timed to coincide with the Jeff Bezos- and Lauren Sánchez Bezos-fronted fashion gala in New York.
And while the Bezos connection dominated headlines in the days running up to the Met Gala’s 78th year, themed “Fashion Is Art,” Chicago offered its own twist on the theme. Here, the assignment was to choose an artwork by a Chicagoan and translate it into the look for the night: “formal to conceptual, playful to profound.”
Suggestions included painter Kerry James Marshall’s “School of Beauty, School of Culture,” graffiti artist Sentrock’s “I’m Still Listening,” multimedia artist Nananko Kono’s “Hangry” and Nick Cave’s soundsuits. And while in Chicago, the event did not have the same celebrity co-chairs as in New York — Anna Wintour, Beyoncé, Nicole Kidman and Venus Williams — tickets for the local event were more accessible to obtain than their namesake and started at $50, the original price to attend the 1948 Met.
The more than 300 tickets sold out days in advance, and among the first to arrive was Terry Verdoscia, 65, of East Lake View, dressed in a hand-painted canvas and petticoat with paint splatter as accessory. Verdoscia, a fine artist and designer of BellaChō sleeves said, “I am art, I do art, this is me. I took it fairly literally.”
Danny Dunson, 50, of Hyde Park, who is the director of curatorial affairs and arts education at the DuSable Black History and Education Center, wore a shirt from the brothers Jack and Nick Cave’s 2022 “Color Is Fashion” exhibition. Dunson curated that show.
“The art theme is really great because we have such amazing artists,” he said.
To further explore artists’ impact on our world, Dunson recommended making a visit to the ongoing “Paris in Black” exhibition that he curated at the DuSable. It explores the “profound journeys of Black artists, writers, performers and intellectuals who found freedom, inspiration and transformation,” he said, “establishing Paris as an essential site of the Black Renaissance.”
Partygoer Lauren Lein, of Streeterville, made her outfit to reference famed late designer Karl Lagerfeld, complete with a matching fluffy white stuffed animal. “You know he left his whole estate to the cat,” quipped Lein, a fashion designer with more than 25 years experience selling to retailers such as Neiman Marcus and Marshall Field’s.
Lein also made her friend Sherrill Bodine’s dress. Bodine remarked that her dress reminded her of a Monet flower. The tiny hummingbirds in her updo were a nod to her late husband, Sean.
Daniella Ashibuogwu, 32, of Streeterville, the chief operating officer of the coalition, also took influence from canvas, but hers was raw, unpainted and ready to become something new. “I feel a blank slate at this point in my life. I took on this new leadership position, started business school, got a new job, I’m transforming,” she said.
The at-capacity Chez Event Venue was draped in rich hues of red and designed by Jacob Lee, Chicago Fashion Coalition art director. Sheer red fabric marked a cozy sitting area, red roses cascaded from the glass staircase, and red Chicago stars dotted the walls.
“Red has been a really important color to me this year,” said Lee, who’s 28. “We’re in a time period when we need to reflect on things in the world. Red is intensity, danger. I don’t want to shy away from that. It’s my role as an artist to speak out.”
Fashion Coalition President Marquan Jones, 28, of Austin, wore a custom suit of diverse patterns and finishes made by local upcycling designer Jen Restyle.
“I’m repping [Chicago artist] Theaster Gates and the Japanese concept of wabi-sabi,” said Jones. “We don’t get to choose our bodies, but we get to choose how we decorate them.”
The hallway and stairs ascending became a makeshift photo studio, and guests graciously tiptoed around each pop-up shoot, noting when to take an extra-long step to miss a hem.
Every few feet, a new photo shoot erupted, ecstatically cheered on by friends and strangers alike. Influencers and subscribers traded contact details and design inspiration.
Although the New York City event was broadcast on larger-than-life screens within the venue, the attendees here only had eyes for their fellow Chicagoans.
The coalition has been making a marked effort to inject life into the fashion scene in the city since its founding by Taylor Naughton in 2021, including creating the inaugural fashion awards.
Without access to multimillion dollar fashion archives like so many celebrities, guests chose to dig into their creativity.
Kendall Hicks, 24, of Beverly, made her entire outfit herself.
“The top is cotton that I manipulated with epoxy. I was inspired by the [2003] ‘Lizzie McGuire Movie’ igloo dress and wanted to take that down to the bare bones but elevate it,” said Hicks.
Married couple Tiffany McPherson-Nolin and Darnell E. Nolin, both 37, of Frankfort, said they didn’t initially plan on coordinating their outfits, but various aspects of color blocking took form in both their ensembles.
Many also took the chance to have fun with their fashionwear. Raymond Dinh, 24, of Edgewater, said, “I decided to come as my most authentic self, a couch potato. All recycled and thrifted materials that I dirtied up, musty but glamorous.”
Milliner Weather Clark, 40, of Bridgeport, completely teal with matching fascinator and dino handbag thought about her favorite place in the city, the dinosaurs at The Field Museum. Her friend and neighbor Kelcie Beene, also 40 and of Bridgeport, asked painter Chistopher Trejo to paint her dress with influences from multimedia print artist Swoon and Frida Kahlo.
All night, wherever Kiara Bond stopped, a crowd gathered. From shoulder to knee, she was enveloped in kanekolan and high-gloss gold, soft curves and coiled curls. Bond, 35, of the South Loop, had created her outfit in the last 24 hours. No matter — she became a showstopper. Inspired by her career as a barber, she “wanted to look like a big hairball, but fun. … Hair can be anything!”
When DJ Ndulgnce cued up hometown heroes Rufus and Chaka Khan’s “Ain’t Nobody (Loves Me Better),” groovers descended on the dance floor, including a man in a Chiquita Banana costume. The city’s most fashionable — and the banana — kept grooving into the night.