The big, wonderful hats of the 2025 Met Gala

Today, seemingly apropos of nothing, my coworker Jordan Darville resurfaced Zendaya’s infamous Big Hat in our Slack channel. He couldn’t possibly have predicted how timely it would become just mere hours later as the 2025 Met Gala commenced and I watched Big Hats — each one larger than the previous — take over the red carpet.

Indeed, behind the impeccably tailored suits, feathers, canes, and long trains, it was hats, ridiculous, comical, incredible hats that stole the show Monday night. Teyana Taylor kicked it off with a big red, pirate-y one that brandished a singular, elegant plume. Actress Kara Young followed with a chesnut-colored bowler hat that appeared to be a spiritual twin to Zendaya’s. Zendaya herself donned a wide-brimmed and askewed white hat that concealed half her face, Jessica Rabbit-style. Doja Cat’s was also her hair (or a wig), made to look like a Russian cossack of sorts. Jodie Turner Smith then arrived with the hat to end all hats, a towering maroon top hat that was an architectural marvel in and of itself.

Perhaps it should’ve been expected. The night’s theme, Superfine: Tailoring Black Style, a celebration of the impact of the Black dandy, inherently meant a celebration of the full spectrum of menswear, which certainly includes hats. But this being the Met Gala, an event predicated on the art of out-dressing, themes often get… liberally interpreted. The hats of last night weren’t so much a homage to the modest pageboy hats and caps of the everyday dandy as they were fanciful creations straight from the imagination: what you’d picture a 1940 dandy to wear if he were being dressed by Alexander McQueen — and that’s just as well and perhaps the point of the Met Gala. One might also connect the hats to the long and rich tradition of the church-going Black auntie or grandma but kicked up several notches.

The good news is that Zendaya’s Big Hat no longer lives alone as a huge hat red carpet moment anymore. See more of the hats from the night, below.