The Met Gala goes global

Witness History

BBC

History, Personal Journals, Society & Culture

4.4 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 27 April 2023

⏱️ 11 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The Met Gala takes place annually on the first Monday in May. In 1995, Vogue’s editor-in-chief Anna Wintour chaired the huge fashion celebration for the first time that takes place at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. Anna changed the date of the celebrity bash from December to May and is the driving force that transformed the event from a society dinner to the star-studded affair labelled “fashion’s biggest night”. The shindig has been attended by stars including Rihanna, Beyoncé and Madonna. Fashion podcaster and former Vogue International editor Suzy Menkes tells Alex Collins about her memories of the gala as it became a global sensation. (Photo: Rihanna at the 2015 Met Gala wearing a dress designed by Guo Pei. Credit: Getty Images)

Transcript

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0:00.0	In 2008, 23-year-old Norwegian student Martina Vick Magnussen was killed in an apartment near Mayfair.
0:08.0	Hours after her death, the only suspect in the case fled the UK to Yemen.
0:13.0	He's never been questioned by the police.
0:16.0	I'm Noel El-Makafi and I made a promise to Martina's family 15 years ago to find out what happened.
0:22.0	Murder in Mayfair.
0:24.0	Part of the documentary, find it wherever you get your BBC podcasts.
0:31.0	Hello and welcome to the Witness History podcast from the BBC World Service with me, Alex Collins.
0:40.0	I'm taking you back to the 4th of December 1995.
0:44.0	We're a New York City for the Fashion Party of the Year.
0:49.0	Anna Winter, Vogue magazine's editor-in-chief, is hosting the Met Gala for the first time.
1:05.0	This is the story of how she transformed the Gala from a formal society dinner to a massive celebrity party that makes headlines around the world.
1:16.0	Susie Mankes, who was the international herald tribune's fashion editor, has attended the Met Gala many times.
1:24.0	But now that Anna's in charge, everything's changed.
1:28.0	There are more famous people than she can count.
1:31.0	Gwyneth Paltrow, Kate Moss and Naomi Campbell.
1:36.0	It was an extraordinary moment when I arrived.
1:41.0	We saw lined up photographers wanting to take pictures of the famous people who were about to climb the stairs.
1:50.0	And then came a whoop of joy from the people who were outside who saw somebody they recognized and knew.
1:56.0	And then very slowly, sometimes extraordinarily slowly, these people would walk up the steps to the top,
2:03.0	posing like mad to all the photographers.
2:06.0	That's the scene of the stars arrive that night at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, one of the world's most famous museums.
2:14.0	They've got Monet's Water Lillies and Pollock's Autumn Rhythm.
	...

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