In case you haven’t noticed all the articles about the most iconic Met Gala looks, the biggest night in fashion is tonight. For those of us who are outside the elite fashion world, we mostly think of the Met Gala as that one weekend in spring where celebrities play rich person Halloween. Year after year, we’re all forced to sadly scroll through our Insta feeds and silently judge A-Listers in outfits that look straight out of The Hunger Games, but like, what if you wanted to go? As you can probably guess, getting a ticket to the Met Gala is about as easy as understanding a Kanye West speech—impossible unless you’re Kim Kardashian. But for those of us determined (read: desperate) enough to try and get an invite, here are some tactics you can use to become one of the privileged few who gets to show up the museum dressed as a big meatball and have everyone call you high fashion.
1. Kill Somebody For Anna Wintour
It goes without saying that in order to get into the Met Gala, you have to first get in with Anna Wintour. According to an anonymous socialite who has been “attending the event for years” (10 bucks says it’s Kris Jenner), “Anna is extremely restrictive on who can buy a ticket.” So restrictive, in fact, that even the 100 member Friends Of The Costume Institute (aka people who give Anna Wintour a shitload of money) often can’t get tickets because “Anna decides they can’t go. Period.” So if you thought maybe you could just wait for that direct deposit to hit and slide Anna a $20, you’re sorely mistaken. No, if you want to get into the Met Gala you’re going to have to do something big to prove to Anna that you are here for the right reasons. Might I suggest figuring out who Anna’s greatest enemy is and taking them out in a late night sting operation? Once you present Anna with the head of the girl who stole her boyfriend in 8th grade (we all have one), Anna will see that you are loyal and overlook your non-celeb status. Maybe she’ll even give you an important job like holding Rihanna’s flask or making sure Kendall Jenner doesn’t go rogue and start offering Pepsi to the security guards. Just don’t expect her to acknowledge you publicly or anything because that shit is not happening.
2. Become A Muse
Are you approximately 10 feet tall and weigh anywhere from 0-15 pounds? Then congratulations! You qualify to be the muse of a famous fashion house, which is one of the most legit ways to get into the Met Gala. Going as the invited guest of one of the major fashion houses comes with some major perks (aka you don’t have to pay for a ticket), but there’s also one major downside: you have to wear what they tell you. This means you could either show up slaying like Zendaya, or show up looking like Katy Perry, who has apparently been cast in The Handmaid’s Tale. Either way, there will be pictures. Lots and lots of pictures.
3. Own A Multimillion-Dollar Company
If all else fails, you could always pull a Corinne and own your own multi-million dollar company. Just make sure it’s profitable enough to shell out $500,000 per table, plus whatever it costs to sponsor the event. These coveted tickets usually go to companies like Apple, Warner Bros, and Yahoo, so you’d better put on your black turtleneck and start ignoring your biological child ASAP because you basically have to be Steve Jobs to get one of these seats. So yeah, your idea for an app that texts you whenever you’re near a good happy hour special probably won’t be good enough. You’ll have to think bigger. Once you do invent the New Internet or whatever, you’ll be allowed to select who sits at your table, just so long as they meet Anna Wintour’s approval. In the Met Gala documentary The First Monday In May (streaming on Netflix if you want to watch models for 90 minutes and feel really bad about yourself), you actually see a Vogue staffer rejecting Calvin Klein’s request to have Josh Hartnett at their table by saying “What has he done lately? Nothing.”
I mean, they ain’t wrong.
4. Be Rich And Desperate
Those who are wealthy enough to afford a ticket but not famous enough to merit an invite can still potentially get in by taking an A-Lister’s hand-me-downs. For example, Beyoncé didn’t go to the Met Gala this year because she’s pregnant with the twin messiahs, so her ticket was up for grabs. According to Cameron Silver, the Fashion Director of H by Halston, “I’ve known of society names who couldn’t get a ticket and are prepped to go if there’s a last-minute seat that becomes available. They have their look ready even if they aren’t certain whether or not they will actually have a seat days before the event.” And if you’re thinking it would require a Bachelor-contestant level of shamelessness to actually pull this off, you’re not wrong. After getting over the fact that you’re basically attending the social event of the season on a tourist visa, your shamelessness will be put to the test once again when you are forced to walk the red carpet despite the fact that nobody knows who tf you are. “Everyone walks the red carpet,” Silver told Page Six, “but less well known guests hear crickets because no one is paying attention. It is one of the most demeaning things to walk those stairs as a non-celebrity.” Honestly, that entire situation sounds like a Hot Cheeto-induced stress dream. I think I’d rather just stay home and judge famous people from the safety of my own couch than show up as a secondhand guest to an A-list event and walk a silent red carpet just so that I can eat the same hors d’oeuvres as Jaden Smith. But yeah, if you’re rich AF and have no problem spending thousands of dollars preparing for an event that you were not invited to, then you can totally spend the first Monday in May sitting by the phone hoping Anna Wintour will call and tell you Kerry Washington got a rash.
5. But Seriously Don’t Fuck With Anna Wintour
One of the most surefire ways to not get into the Met Gala (apart from being just like, a regular person) is to get on Anna Wintour’s bad side. Celebs who have been banned from the event include supermodel Coco Rocha (probably for accusing gala co-chair Katy Perry of stealing Rocha’s 2016 Met Gala look for the VMAs), Tim Gunn (for talking shit about Anna being carried down the stairs at a fashion show in 2006), and Rachel Zoe who made the huge mistake of saying she was “more influential than Wintour” in an interview. Bad move, Rachel. No amount of Bravo TV stardom will save you from the fact that Anna Wintour is petty AF and has a loooooong memory. I mean, the woman’s been editor of Vogue for what, 200 years? 300? Honestly, I heard a rumor she once banned Marie Antoinette from the Marc Jacobs after party because she was overheard shit talking the cake.
