Serena Williams Stays Winning in a Gilded Gown at the 2024 Met Gala

Serena Williams just brought her winning style to the steps of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Tonight in New York City, the tennis champion made a dazzling arrival at the 2024 Met Gala. To interpret this year’s “Garden of Time” dress code, Williams opted to dress up like a literal trophy in a metallic gilded gown, a custom-made Balenciaga couture creation. The unique golden piece had two trains extending down to the floor—one draping from behind her shoulder and the other descending from a side leg slit.

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The star accented the knockout look with a few black elements, including opera-length gloves, sheer tights, and stiletto pumps. Finally, she rounded the outfit off with some pieces of Messika jewelry, from a pair of earrings to a sparkly ring.

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At last year’s Met Gala, Williams announced her second pregnancy by showing off her baby bump in a sophisticated black gown from Gucci. (Since then, she has given birth to a second daughter, whom she and husband Alexis Ohanian named Adira River.)

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This year’s dress code is “The Garden of Time,” a concept inspired by J.G. Ballard’s 1962 short story of the same name. In essence, the theme examines the intrinsic connection between time and natural beauty—leaving the door wide open for attendees to interpret the dress code as they please.

“The Garden of Time” also complements the Costume Institute’s spring exhibition, “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion,” which will include about “250 objects spanning four centuries” from the institute’s vast collection, all of them “visually united by iconography related to nature, which will serve as a metaphor for the fragility and ephemerality of fashion,” according to a press release. The exhibition will feature a number of modern technologies in its display, too, “from cutting-edge tools, artificial intelligence, and computer-generated imagery to traditional formats of x-rays, video animation, light projection, and soundscapes.”

As an associate editor at HarpersBAZAAR.com, Chelsey keeps a finger on the pulse on all things celeb news. She also writes on social movements, connecting with activists leading the fight on workers' rights, climate justice, and more. Offline, she’s probably spending too much time on TikTok, rewatching Emma (the 2020 version, of course), or buying yet another corset. 

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