Costume Art at the Met: Clothes Beside the Paintings

The Costume Institute's spring 2026 exhibition makes a plain claim and builds a large room around it. Clothes are not a footnote to art, the Met argues in Costume Art. They are one of its oldest subjects. The show has been open since May 10 and runs through Jan. 10, 2027, in Gallery 099 at The Met Fifth Avenue. It is free with museum admission.

The premise

Costume Art explores depictions of the dressed body across the Met's collection, pairing garments from the Costume Institute with objects from the museum's other collecting areas. The Met says the focus is primarily Western art from prehistory to the present. The pairings run, in the museum's own words, from the formal to the conceptual, the aesthetic to the political, the individual to the universal, the illustrative to the symbolic, and the playful to the profound. They are organized into thematic body types that, the museum says, reflect their pervasiveness and endurance through time and cultures.

That is a sound curatorial device. A gown beside a painting of a figure in similar drapery asks the viewer to compare two kinds of making, and neither gets the upper hand. The Met's own text on the exhibition describes it as treating dress as an interpretive framework instead of an illustrative supplement to the art.

The curator in charge of the Costume Institute, Andrew Bolton, recorded a tour of the show, which the museum published on May 28. Max Hollein, the Met's director and chief executive, described the show in the February announcement as "a dynamic and scholarly conversation" between garments and artworks. He also pointed to the museum's ability to position fashion within the context of more than 5,000 years of art in its collection.

A new set of galleries

Costume Art is the first exhibition in new galleries of nearly 12,000 square feet adjacent to the Great Hall. The Met says the space will display the Costume Institute's annual spring show and, at times, shows from other curatorial departments, including those that explore the intersection of fashion and art. In recognition of a lead gift from Condé Nast, the space is named for the company's founder, the late Condé M. Nast. Additional contributions toward the renovation came from Thom Browne, and from Michael Kors and Lance Le Pere. Aerin Lauder Zinterhofer, Tory Burch LLC, Nancy C. and Richard R. Rogers, and Amy Griffin and John Griffin gave further support.

The galleries and the exhibition were designed by Miriam Peterson and Nathan Rich of Peterson Rich Office, a Brooklyn-based architecture firm. A home next to the Great Hall puts the Costume Institute's spring show on a route most visitors already walk.

Money, names and a catalogue

The exhibition and the Costume Institute Benefit, known as the Met Gala, were made possible by Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sánchez Bezos, with additional support from Saint Laurent and Condé Nast. Saint Laurent also made the catalogue possible. The catalogue's description says it asserts the central role of the dressed body throughout art history and presents fashion as an essential expression of creativity and identity.

The Gala is the show's financial engine. The Met says it takes place on the first Monday in May and provides the Costume Institute with its primary source of annual funding for exhibitions, publications, acquisitions and operations. CNN reported that the 2026 event raised a record $42 million, up from a record $31 million the year before.

That financial arrangement is part of the story and not a footnote. A museum show with a title sponsor pays for its research through an evening of celebrity and corporate attention. The Costume Institute has made that bargain for years. In 2026 it drew protests in New York, which CNN covered, because of the sponsors named above. The exhibition itself is a separate object, and it should be judged on what hangs in the gallery.

How to see it

The show is in Gallery 099, next to the Great Hall, and no separate ticket is required. Admission to the museum covers it, which lowers the cost of a second visit. A viewer can look at the paired objects in one trip, then return to study a single pairing in another.

A few questions help. Does the garment or the painting carry the pairing? When the two disagree, which one corrects the other? And does the thematic grouping by body type teach something a chronology could not? The museum's framing is ambitious, and it puts the burden on the pairings.

The Met also offers an inside look at the project on its website, along with essays such as The Body Is Art, which discusses the corset and drapery among its subjects. Those texts are useful before a visit, because they give the vocabulary the galleries assume.

Where it sits in the season

Costume Art is one of several fashion shows in the city this year. At the Brooklyn Museum, Iris van Herpen: Sculpting the Senses runs through Dec. 6. Together the two form a pair of arguments, one about the body in art history and one about the body in couture technology. A visitor with a weekend can see both.

For readers in New York, the best time to go is before the January close. The galleries are among the museum's newest, and the show is the one that inaugurated them. Whatever happens in later years, Costume Art is the first thing the room has said.

FAQ

How long does Costume Art run?

May 10, 2026 through Jan. 10, 2027, at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 099.

Does it cost extra?

No. It is free with museum admission, according to the Met.

What is new about the space?

It is the first show in the Met's new galleries of nearly 12,000 square feet next to the Great Hall, named for Condé M. Nast.

Who designed the exhibition?

Miriam Peterson and Nathan Rich of Peterson Rich Office designed the exhibition and the galleries.

Sources

*Cover photo: UKinUSA, Wikimedia Commons, *[*https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Andrew_Bolton_OBE_Honours_Evening_with_Dame_Anna_Wintour_in_the_United_States_on_30_October_2024_-_8.jpg*](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Andrew_Bolton_OBE_Honours_Evening_with_Dame_Anna_Wintour_in_the_United_States_on_30_October_2024_-_8.jpg)* (CC BY-SA 2.0).*