“그거 벗어봐 불쌍하잖아” (Take that off, it looks pitiful)
My mom eyed me up and down with disapproving eyes.
Clawing at my plain white tee and loose pair of jeans searching for stains, I was puzzled by her rather snide comment. Nothing seemed wrong.
My twin Andrew appeared at the doorway ready to leave for dinner. There he was, bundled in a silky satin gray sweater and a pair of polished, rather high-rise nylon cargo pants. To top it off, he had a pair of suede Nike blazers — objectively, he looked good. Presentable.
“Okay, maybe I can’t go out like this,” I mumbled to myself.
Glancing at myself once more in the mirror, my white tee and pair of jeans looked wearier than usual. The flaws beamed brighter: wrinkles seemed to form mountains; my jeans were drained of color. Defeated, I retreated back to the closet.
My mom has been the family fashion police for as long as I can remember. But I’ve been her only convict, charged with a million counts of tastelessness, which this time, apparently means a shirt and baggy jeans.
“Collin and Andrew 옷을 잘입잖아,” (Collin and Andrew dress well) my mom remarked as she meticulously sifted through a row of clothes hangers. She revealed a new jacket with fur protruding out from the sleeves for me to wear. I was visibly bothered while my two brothers smirked behind me.
My brothers and I always agreed that our mom made the most amusing suggestions when it came to fashion. Whatever she held up in front of her might as well have been a whimsical pink polka-dotted suit.
“I’m not wearing that,” I told her, instead grabbing a simple, green field army jacket beside her and draping it over my shoulders before heading towards the front door.
Yet again, I escaped the fashion police. My lifelong sentence would never be served.
***
I must admit, my apparent lack of style can be marked by a tendency to choose whatever is resting at the summit of a mountain of clothes. A crinkled New York Knicks shirt and a pair of cargo shorts? Not a problem. One of my many free University of Michigan t-shirts and a pair of sweatpants? Even better. But in my mom’s eyes, that could be two more life sentences, depending on the occasion.
My mom is a jewelry designer, and Andrew is a graphic design student, which might naturally build their fashion credibility. But to me, fashion is a constant mystery, sometimes even bordering on bullshit.
Just look at this year’s Met Gala.
I never follow fashion shows or events, but I managed to stumble across pictures from this year’s Met Gala, specifically Michelle Yeoh’s Balenciaga tin-foil gown, on TikTok and Instagram. Falling deeper into this Met Gala rabbit hole, I caught glimpses of Zendaya’s vineyard dress, Nicki Minaj in an artsy fauna dress, Chris Hemsworth in a suit, Dwyane Wade in a suit, Jack Harlow in a suit — wait, why were most of the men just wearing fairly standard suits?
The tabs on my computer gradually began to multiply as I investigated the designers of extravagant garments and absorbed any and all coverage of the event. Eventually, my research led me to one fundamental question: What is the point of the Met Gala?
The Met Gala is an annual fashion fundraising event for the Costume Institute of the Met hosted on the first Monday of May at the Metropolitan Museum of Art — or the Met, what a surprise! The guest list includes high profile celebrities and features the best of the best luxury designer brands: Dior, Chanel, Balenciaga and all the other luxury brands that I incorrectly pronounce without an accent. On the night of this event, a few celebrities serve as co-chairs of the event, working to facilitate and promote the event. Stars from all realms and avenues don the finest, most flamboyant clothing that seems to transcend the very definition of fashion and art based on a single theme — it is truly a marvel not seen anywhere else.
This year’s theme was “The Garden of Time.”
The red carpet displayed a beautiful ensemble of botanical outfits that sang with melodies of vibrant color — outfits that could not satiate the ravenous hunger of hounding paparazzi cameras and microphones. But, there was also a surprising surplus of not-so extravagant, not-so profound and definitely not-so botanical outfits that were as jarring as fingernails on a chalkboard. Take a tin foil gown and plain black tuxedos for example. Maybe Yeoh’s tin foil look hoped to reference the tin foil hats everyone might wear when aliens take over the planet and all the world’s fauna dies, and perhaps the standard tuxedos merely adhered to a simple, timeless and formal look.
Even at such a high-profile event that raises 8-digit sums of money every year, I am happily reassured that there is no fashion standard anyone needs to abide by. Raging debates in articles and social media comment sections about celebrities’ outfits loosely deem them as either “good” or “bad” and “simple” or “nuanced” without much justification — take that mom! My simple t-shirts and jeans are probably perfectly fine!
Fashion is undoubtedly a form of self-expression and possibly a method of performance art, especially within the grandeur setting of the Met Gala. The event is exclusive and rich — a coveted, shiny thing to gaze upon. However, despite the carefully handpicked materials and calculated design choices, all of which possess abstract meaning and are bound by even more abstract interpretations, the success and reception of many of these outfits is ultimately dictated by reviews from the media. But there are also “sheeple,” people who hop on the bandwagon of like or dislike merely based on how others react. Everyone likes Zendaya’s outfit? Then me too! Suddenly everyone hates Zendaya’s outfit? Oh, then me too!
But perhaps that’s the point of the Met Gala — it is meant to be judged, and we judge because we want to judge.
The formula for the event has been more or less the same since its establishment in 1946, and it has all the ingredients for a perfect judging storm: assemble an Avengers-level brigade of celebrities, subject them to a grandiose world of regalia — or simplicity — and watch the world begin to produce lists of best and worst outfits — or even better — lists of celebrities who specifically didn’t follow the annual dress code.
But humans live and breathe patterns. It is in our nature to search for patterns and instinctively deduce the odd one out, which means we judge. Judging could mean noticing Michelle Yeoh’s tin foil dress among the many seemingly regular tuxedos or noticing those seemingly regular tuxedos amongst a galore of extravagant dresses. We derive satisfaction from noticing patterns — from finding the odd one out and pointing it out.
Oh wait, I’ve been sounding like a new recruit for the fashion police. I’ve been judging outfits the entire time. Maybe I am Jack Harlow in a standard tuxedo while Andrew is Zendaya in a nice dress.
Statement Columnist Philip (Sooyoung) Ham can be reached at philham@umich.edu.
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