Lifestyle
A Fashion Revolution at the Met
Fashion has always sat uncomfortably in the great art institutions of the West, the question of whether it belonged under the same roof as masterworks and heroic marbles a subject of perennial debate. After all, these creations weren’t hung on a wall or put on a pedestal; they were (cue dismissive sniff) worn. They may have been a part of pop culture, but could they really be classed with high culture?
In London and Paris the answer was to relegate dress to separate museums of decorative arts — the Victoria & Albert and Musée des Arts Décoratifs. And in New York, while the Metropolitan Museum of Art may have swallowed its pride in 1946 and deigned to accept the clothes, it put the new fashion department in … the basement. Talk about a metaphor for museum hierarchies.
This week, however, the Condé M. Nast galleries, a 12,000-square-foot permanent space, is being unveiled for the Costume Institute. The galleries have replaced the former museum gift shop, just to the right of the information desk in the Great Hall. Rather than being hidden below ground, the fashion department is now the first thing people see when they enter the museum.
Shh. Listen. Hear that? It is the sound of 80 years of argument ending.
And it is a reflection of the simple fact that it is now fashion that gets people through the doors of these august — some might say old — institutions. It’s the thing everyone can relate to and comfortably opine on, unlike, say, de Kooning, because, hey, everyone wears clothes.
If in doubt, simply consider that of the 10 most-visited Met exhibitions in modern history, half of them were Costume Institute exhibitions. No other department is represented more than once. Or consider “Costume Art,” the exhibition that opens the new space.
This year’s fashion blockbuster — the one celebrated by the Met Gala on Monday night — “Costume Art” both acknowledges fashion’s role as the new entry point to the museum and makes the case for why the change is long overdue. It’s as if the exhibition were holding out its hand and saying to all who enter, “Hello, let me be your guide to the treasures we have throughout this place.”
The show suggests that fashion — or “the dressed body” — is the essential connective tissue of the 17 different departments and 19 collecting areas of the Met, the one element present in every discipline, no matter what century or art form is under discussion. It does this by pairing approximately 200 garments and accessories with 200 pieces of art borrowed from across the museum’s six miles of galleries.
You see the connection from the moment you enter the soaring new space, through an anteroom just off the Great Hall, dedicated to what is now termed “naked dressing.” Think Dilara Findikoglu’s 2023 sheer dress with strategically placed coils of hair, like Lady Godiva fashion cosplay, paired with an 18th century Venetian bronze nude, the hands strategically placed just like the hair. That’s one way to hook ‘em.
The Museums Special Section
It’s no accident that the entry also includes a double-sided vitrine that houses four mannequins. Two of them face outward toward the grand staircase and wear sheer body stockings, one by Vivienne Westwood and one by Andrea Adamo, each with a silver fig leaf over their nether regions. Andrew Bolton, the Costume Institute’s curator in charge, has never been afraid of playing to the crowd.
Created by Miriam Peterson and Nathan Rich of the architecture firm Peterson Rich, which also designed the exhibition, the galleries have been conceived to fit seamlessly into the existing semiology of the museum. They are floored in white granite, replete with classic pedestals and platforms, and bathed in a soft glow (since fabric is too fragile to be exposed to daylight, this has been created by recessed uplighting). It’s as if the new galleries had always been there; as if fashion had always belonged.
Rather than dress up the exhibition with fancy scenography, or guest film directors as Bolton has often done in the past, the space allows the interplay between fashion and the rest of the galleries to sit front and center. It is, after all, a relatively straightforward idea: an Issey Miyake molded gold breastplate and a mini-me Etruscan cuirass! A Fortuny pleated Delphos gown and a Greek terra-cotta vase featuring a figure in a pleated gown! A Rei Kawakubo for Comme des Garçons armless felted construction and a stone Henry Moore with the exact same curves.
And really, it’s hard to argue with the connection between Van Gogh’s “Irises” and the Yves Saint Laurent jacket that reproduced that painting in sequins, or the Loewe shirt by Jonathan Anderson that did the same on a feather-festooned couture version of a concert tee.
But such banal relationships are actually few and far between in the show, which is after something deeper and more complicated. There is, thankfully, no Mondrian “Broadway Boogie Woogie” with matching dresses in the exhibition; no Warhol soup cans and Warhol soup can shifts.
Warhol is represented, natch, but by a Richard Avedon portrait of the artist’s bullet-scarred torso, juxtaposed against a Coperni dress, its slashes resected with silver spirals. Even those Van Gogh irises turn out to be linked not just by flowers, but by the mental health struggles of the men who made the works, the way both the designer Chet Lo’s gowns covered in little knit spikes and Picasso’s “The Blind Man’s Meal” reflect the importance of tactile understanding.
Indeed, the organizing principle of the show, rather than chronology, is the body itself: both the kinds of bodies that distinguish us, and the bodily experiences we share. And that is the product of a fairly radical rethinking of how fashion relates to art.
For decades, the justifications for considering fashion as an art form involved denaturing it, separating it from its practical purpose and corporeal reality, and focusing instead on its textile value — embroidery, beading, decoration — or its construction. With this show, Bolton is slyly subverting that idea, suggesting instead that it is fashion’s dependence on the body itself that makes it central to any and all art practices: That the real connective issue between fashion and art is the way in which both are used to challenge and shape perception — of the body, of beauty; of who we are and how we see. Understanding the one helps to understand the other.
That’s why the clothes in this exhibition often sit atop the art, a subtle upending of the traditional status quo that speaks to both Bolton’s thesis and the department’s new status. It’s also why the exhibit layout serves to guide you through a maze of bodily types in its two main galleries, the Thom Browne gallery, and the Michael Kors and Lance Le Pere gallery. Among them are the classical body, the corpulent body, the disabled body, the pregnant body, the inscribed body, the anatomical body and the mortal body.
(The terminology, the product of consultation with different interest groups, can be a little abstruse, but the taxonomy has led to one real change: the creation of mannequins beyond the unrealistically thin and sylphlike.)
You don’t have to get any of this to enjoy the show, of course. It may be less magical than some Costume Institute shows such as 2011’s “Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty,” 2018’s “Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination,” and even last year’s “Superfine: Tailoring Black Style.” But it is delightful to happen upon an unexpected treasure, such as a miniature Egyptian Omphale figure that seems to glow from within, or Fred Tomaselli’s 1992 work “Behind Your Eyes,” a life-size male nude with a body built out of pills that the Met acquired in 2019 but that has never been shown. Or, for that matter, to discover the beauty in the blood red venous structures of a Robert Wun gown, like a flayed dress.
The fashion masters (Worth, Vionnet, Kawakubo and so on) are all here, sure, like the old masters, but so are many more names most people will not know. As a sign of what sort of role fashion is going to play in the Met going forward, “Costume Art” is a clear statement of intent.
The last room in the exhibition acts as a bookend to the first, focusing not on nudity, but on skin itself before disgorging visitors into the Byzantine galleries. Anders Bergstrom’s wrenching “Brown Bag Test,” which wrestles with early-20th-century racism and the way skin tones were used for discrimination, is there, along with Christian Louboutin’s set of “Hot Chick” stiletto shoes in eight different shades of nude. Both are set against the backdrop of the original brick and concrete outer wall of the Met, which was hidden when the Great Hall and grand entry staircase were added in 1902.
The wall was uncovered when the gift shop was demolished, and it has been left in its original state, as if to remind you that it, too, has been here all along. It’s just that, like the foregrounding of fashion in art, it took this long for everyone to realize it. Now that they have, there is room for an even more interesting question: What’s next?
Cinematography by Jensen Gore.
Costume Art
Members Preview, May 5, 7-9; opens May 10 — Jan. 10, 2027, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1000 Fifth Ave., 212-535-7710; metmuseum.org.
Lonnie Bunch III is the 14th Secretary of the Smithsonian. He’s pictured above in September 2017.
J. Scott Applewhite/AP
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J. Scott Applewhite/AP
In a memo addressed to staffers sent Tuesday, the secretary of the Smithsonian, Lonnie G. Bunch III, defended the institution after the White House issued a 162-page report that characterizes the National Museum of American History as a place which has become “subject to institutional capture by a radical, activist ideology that is fundamentally opposed to telling the noble, honest story of the great country we know and love.”
In his email, which NPR has obtained, Bunch wrote in part: “While there will always be room for improvement, this report is not a fair characterization of the work and totality of the National Museum of American History. At the Smithsonian, our work is driven by scholarship, accuracy and an uncompromising commitment to tell the fullness of America’s story. As public servants and the keepers of this institution, we are charged with helping a nation find understanding, hope and clarity and as part of that duty, we are dedicated to excellence, reflection and growth.”
He continued: “We remain focused on what grounds us: a steadfast commitment to scholarship, nonpartisanship, independence, accuracy and integrity. For nearly 180 years, the Smithsonian has worked alongside partners across government — from the White House to Congress to our governing Board of Regents — guided by our enduring mission to increase and diffuse knowledge. That purpose remains: to pursue knowledge with rigor and to serve the American public with clarity and care.”
The White House report was issued on July 4 by the Domestic Policy Council under the title “Saving America’s Story: How Ideological Capture at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History Erases Our Heritage.”
The council faults the National Museum of American History on a multitude of fronts, saying it underemphasized the Founding Fathers and early colonial and Revolutionary history; was not sufficiently celebratory of the country’s 250th anniversary; and that it engaged in “anti-white,” “illegal alien” and transgender activism.
It also accuses the museum of trying to “indoctrinate” teachers and students through its exhibitions, programming and teaching resources.
In the report, the council also specifically criticizes museum director Anthea Hartig, who has led the National Museum of American History since 2019 and is concurrently the president of the Organization of American Historians, calling her “an activist advancing an ideological agenda contradictory to the museum’s founding purpose of fostering patriotism.”
The Trump administration has made the Smithsonian museums one of its primary targets in its efforts to reshape cultural narratives to align with its viewpoints. In August 2025, the White House requested a “comprehensive internal review” of eight Smithsonian museums, including the National Museum of American History, following an executive order issued by President Trump in March 2025 in which he called for the removal of “improper ideology” from the Smithsonian’s offerings.
According to the Smithsonian’s charter, all of its 21 museums, 14 education and research centers, and the National Zoo are meant to be run independently of the federal government. The Smithsonian is overseen by Bunch and a board of regents, which includes Vice President Vance, Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts and other members appointed by Congress.
In an interview with NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday, Bunch spoke about the Smithsonian’s 250th anniversary special exhibition at the Smithsonian Castle, which is called “American Aspirations.”
He told NBC: “It’s really important for people to understand that America is much an ideal as it is a place, that it’s a series of aspirations that have really shaped who this country is. And so for me, what is so powerful is to say, ‘Let us honor the words of Thomas Jefferson and the founders, but let us use those to challenge us to be better.’”
Jennifer Vanasco edited this story.
It was after the death of her son, Laith, that Esme Saleh decided to become a folk artist.
She had always been creative, experimenting with watercolors and learning to sew and embroider at a young age.
“I had a creative inkling,” she said, “but I never pursued it.”
Everything changed on Aug. 17, 2013.
In this series, we highlight independent makers and artists, from glassblowers to fiber artists, who are creating original products in and around Los Angeles.
When Saleh was nine months pregnant, she woke up with stomach pains and presumed she was in labor. She and her husband, Nasim, immediately went to the hospital, where doctors checked her and put the baby on a heart monitor. Saleh’s blood pressure was high, however, and the baby’s heart rate kept dropping. After about an hour, his heartbeat stopped. Doctors rushed her in for an emergency C-section, but it was too late. Laith did not survive.
Saleh lost a tremendous amount of blood and developed postpartum HELLP syndrome, a dangerous form of preeclampsia, but doctors were able to stabilize her.
When she woke up, the first thing she asked was, “How’s my baby?”
After losing her son in 2013, Esme Saleh left her job as a television producer. Since then, she has sold her hand-painted candles to local designers in Los Angeles and to LVMH in Paris.
“Aug. 17, 2013, was the most difficult day of my life, and Aug. 22 was the second most difficult, the day we drove home with an empty car seat,” she said of her and her husband’s new reality.
They named their son Laith Finn Saleh.
“His first name means ‘lion’ in Arabic. His middle name is an ode to Huckleberry Finn — sharp wit, kind heart, strong moral compass — all the attributes he’s imparted on us in spirit,” said Saleh, 45.
After such a devastating loss, she found it difficult to trust the world again. “It was hard to trust anything,” she said. “The medical system. Myself. It made me realize the fragility of bringing anything to life. We take so much for granted.”
So after years of working as a television producer, Saleh left broadcast journalism and leaned into her creative spirit.
She grew up in San Diego. Her mother was raised on a farm in Mexico, and her father moved from Tijuana to Los Angeles to be near her mother, who started working for a family in Sherman Oaks at 16. They eventually settled in San Diego, where Saleh’s father, now a church deacon, worked as a car salesman.
“The word Mystic has also become a driving force of what this journey means to me,” Saleh says. “A magical, otherworldly journey that has led me to some beautiful friendships, projects and unlimited well of curiosity. When I paint each pair of candles, it feels like I’m imparting a piece of that magic.”
“He always wanted to be a weatherman on TV,” she said, explaining how he hoped to get his big break on television by doing a weather report from the car lot.
Saleh wanted to be a broadcast journalist as her father had. After graduating from San Diego State, she interned in the sports department at CBS affiliate KFMB-TV although she didn’t know much about sports. She enjoyed sharing information with people, learned how to write plays of the week and felt she had found the right career.
But during a summer class at Mesa College, she started to think journalism might not be for her.
Saleh’s home is filled with her artwork. “My home expresses a lot of the things that I do,” she says. “If it works here, then I feel like I can put it out in the world.”
“I’m an empath — a sensitive soul — so when I was reading news about death and destruction, my eyes could not lie,” she said. Her professor told her, “This may not be your thing.” But when she arranged flowers on camera, she really came alive. She decided to work behind the scenes as a producer.
Her professor helped her get her first network news job in 2003, and she moved to Los Angeles, working on hard news and entertainment coverage.
After losing Laith a decade later, she couldn’t keep doing red-carpet interviews and acting like everything was fine. “It all felt so different, superficial and hard,” she said. “I felt like there was a bigger purpose out there for me. It’s in the small things that we find the big things.”
She started by painting folk art-inspired invitations for a friend’s baby shower. She painted delicate flowers, oranges and leaves on glass, leather and even lampshades. She created a logo. “I was just trying to say yes to things that were really scary,” she said. “Laith gave me the courage to do that.”
“I was just trying to get out of hole,” Saleh says of taking up painting after her son died.
Her first son, she said, became “a catalyst for painting.”
Then, at the first Thanksgiving during the COVID-19 pandemic when people could gather again, she had a light-bulb moment. “I was setting the table and didn’t have flowers or anything to add to decorate, so I thought, ‘I have these candles. I’m going to paint them and make them fancy,’ ” she said.
Her guests were impressed.
As time went on, painting taper candles helped her find joy again, and others noticed too.
“The one thing I hear when people pick up a pair of my candles is, ‘This makes me so happy. It makes me feel like there’s life here,’ ” she said.
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1. Saleh sometimes leads painting workshops where participants can decorate items like ornaments and lampshades.
2. Leather napkin rings Saleh has painted for Nathan Turner. 3. Saleh’s hand-painted candles retail for approximately $42 to $50.
One of the hardest parts of losing a child “is that you’re not just grieving the person, you’re grieving the future you imagined with them,” said Chicago-based grief specialist Carla Harvey. “A lifetime of love suddenly has nowhere to go. Creating art doesn’t erase grief, but it can become a way to carry it.”
Saleh created her brand Mystic by Esme in 2021, but it took her some time before she could gather the courage to try to sell them.
When she brought a shoebox full of samples to Nickey Kehoe, the L.A. store agreed to carry her candles. “I was beside myself,” Saleh said.
“Her candles were absolutely beautiful, and she had a fantastic spirit that made selling them a no-brainer,” said interior designer Todd Nickey, co-founder of Nickey Kehoe.
Saleh gets a surprise kiss from her dog Olive while painting candles at her dining room table.
Saleh viewed her new side project as a way to earn extra money for piano lessons for her 11-year-old son Linus, who is an entrepreneur like his mother. “I felt proud painting the candles while he was in lessons in the next room,” she said. “It became this circular economy, and it led to bigger opportunities for me.”
Last year, luxury conglomerate LVMH commissioned Saleh to paint 465 pairs of candles, or 930 candles in total, for its Chaumet jewelry brand. The collection was unveiled at an elaborate event at the Abbaye des Vaux de Cernay, just outside Paris.
“It was fun,” Saleh said about the process, which took six months from conception to delivery. “I felt like I was dressing my candles up for a party.”
Always a hard worker, which she attributes to being a first-generation child of immigrant parents, Saleh has now created a candle collection for Pierce and Ward in Los Feliz, leather napkin holders for interior designer Nathan Turner and pomegranate wrapping paper for Olive Ateliers. The candles retail between $42 to $50 for a pair, and recently, she developed a handsome pewter candle shaver that will be released in the winter.
Her dining room can sometimes feel like “an assembly line,” Saleh says.
Saleh holds a pair of candles she has embellished with florals.
Occasionally, she leads painting workshops, and she loves helping others tap into their creativity. The most meaningful one for her was an ornament workshop attended by several victims of the 2025 Los Angeles wildfires. “Without saying anything, we understood each other,” she said. “I understood that they were trying to create memories.”
Saleh knows what it means for things not to last — “impermanence,” she calls it — whether it is homes, candles or life itself.
She paints every day in the art-filled dining room of her home (unless it’s Little League season), surrounded by her family, candles and her two dogs, Lennon and Olive. ”Painting is like meditation,” she said. “You can sit in your dining room and tune everything out and just be in the moment.”
Even the family’s summer bucket list receives an artistic flourish.
An arch inside Saleh’s home receives a personalized touch.
She knows painting candles isn’t new, but she believes her motivation and the care she puts into each candle makes them special beyond their looks.
She has learned to look at the world that way, that painting in her dining room has offered her healing and joy, that she can trust herself and her body, that continuing to be inspired by her two boys — “one in spirit and the other here on Earth” — means that Laith will always be with her.
Many people think healing means moving on, said grief specialist Harvey, but “it’s really about finding ways to move forward while keeping the people we love woven into our lives. That’s what I see in her candles, not an ending, but an ongoing relationship with her son.”
“I feel like my son is channeling through this medium,” Saleh said, her voice breaking as she painted a taper. “He’s whispering to me, ‘Mom, this is your path.’ That has been my driving force. We’re going to grow this together.”
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