The 2027 Met Gala Will Explore John Galliano’s Complicated Legacy

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Rarely in the history of the Met Gala has the Costume Institute honored a living designer—just two times, in fact, with Yves Saint Laurent in 1983 and Rei Kawakubo in 2017. But for the 2027 edition, the spotlight shifts to the work of John Galliano, one of fashion’s most imaginative and controversial designers.

Announced on July 31, “John Galliano: Horizons” will highlight the Gibraltar-born designer’s decades-spanning work, from his scrappy graduate show as a Central Saint Martins student in the 1980s to his most recent role at Maison Margiela, from which he departed in 2024. Expect “garments, accessories, sketches, toiles, research books, and archival materials” from Galliano’s infamous, shockingly creative era at Dior and his short-lived but much-lauded stint at Givenchy.

The exhibition, which runs from May 9, 2027 through January 9, 2028, concludes with pieces from the designer’s spring/summer 2024 artisanal show for Maison Margiela.

Zendaya in a Maison Margiela gown by Galliano at the 2024 Met Gala.

Galliano’s theatrical, world-building creations and covetable accessories have been fodder for fashion insiders and the celebrity set over the years. That includes the Met Gala, where his designs have been worn on the biggest red carpet in the world by the likes of Kim Kardashian and Zendaya.

“Every Galliano collection begins as a journey among things separated by time, place, or medium: portrait and posture, silhouette and story, memory and material,” Andrew Bolton, curator in charge of the Costume Institute, said in a release. “‘Horizons’ approaches fashion as a form of cartography, mapping not territories but affinities, tensions, and transformations. It traces how images become ideas, ideas become material, and material becomes emotion. Yet a horizon reveals not only what lies before us, but also where we stand.”

A look from Galliano’s spring/summer 2000 Dior couture show.

Eva Herzigova at Galliano’s spring/summer 1997 show for Givenchy.

While Galliano’s creative contributions remain among the most influential in modern fashion, the exhibition also plans to examine the complexities of his legacy and 2011 downfall, according to Bolton’s statement. The show is organized into three sections—“Bearings,” “Horizons,” and “Atlas of Transformation”—with the first covering his dismissal from Dior.

“The exhibition therefore considers both how Galliano has remapped the world through fashion and how his conduct, its consequences, and changing cultural values have reshaped our understanding of his work,” he notes.