The Met Announces Costume Art, the Spring 2026 Costume Institute Exhibition and Opening of the New Condé M. Nast Galleries
The Metropolitan Museum of Art has announced Costume Art, the Spring 2026 Costume Institute exhibition, which will examine the “centrality of the dressed body,” bringing together garments from The Costume Institute with objects from across the Museum’s global collection. The exhibition will open on May 10, 2026, and run through January 10, 2027.
Costume Art will inaugurate the Museum’s newly built Condé M. Nast Galleries, a nearly 12,000-square-foot space adjacent to the Great Hall that will host The Costume Institute’s annual spring exhibitions. The Galleries are named in recognition of a lead gift from Condé Nast, with additional support from Thom Browne, Michael Kors and Lance Le Pere, Met Trustee Aerin Lauder, Tory Burch LLC, Nancy C. and Richard R. Rogers, and Met Trustees Amy and John Griffin.
Max Hollein, The Met’s Marina Kellen French Director and CEO, said: “Costume Art will present a dynamic and scholarly conversation between garments from The Costume Institute and an array of artworks from across The Met’s vast collection, elevating universal and timeless themes while bringing forward new ideas and ways of seeing. This immensely creative and collaborative exhibition will demonstrate the Museum’s innovative and forward-thinking approach to presenting Costume Institute exhibitions, and will highlight The Met’s unique ability to position fashion within the context of more than 5,000 years of art represented in its collection. The newly designed, state-of-the-art Condé M. Nast Galleries further reflect The Met’s commitment to displaying and appreciating fashion as an art form, and also to continually investing in gallery improvement projects that will benefit our visitors for generations to come. We are deeply grateful to all of our donors for their remarkable generosity to create these new, grand public galleries.”
Organized around thematic body types that appear throughout Western art—from the “Naked Body” and the “Classical Body” to the “Pregnant Body” and the “Ageing Body”—the exhibition will explore how the body and clothing continually shape one another. Pairings of artworks and garments will trace connections “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.” Works will be displayed on traditional museum pedestals and platforms, reinterpreted here to establish equivalency between art objects and bodies represented.
Andrew Bolton, Curator in Charge of The Costume Institute, noted: “For The Costume Institute’s inaugural exhibition in the Condé M. Nast Galleries, I wanted to focus on the centrality of the dressed body within the Museum, connecting artistic representations of the body with fashion as an embodied artform. Rather than prioritizing fashion’s visuality, which often comes at the expense of the corporeal, Costume Art privileges its materiality and the indivisible connection between our bodies and the clothes we wear. The opening of the new Galleries will mark a pivotal moment for the department, one that acknowledges the critical role that fashion plays not only within art history but also within contemporary culture. I am grateful to Max for his support and to the generous donors to the Galleries for their belief in fashion’s transformative possibilities.”
The Condé M. Nast Galleries, designed by Miriam Peterson and Nathan Rich of Peterson Rich Office (PRO), will also periodically house exhibitions from other Met departments, particularly those at the intersection of art and fashion. Their opening marks the first stage of a broader reimagining of the Great Hall area, which will later include updates to the Museum’s 83rd Street entrance, dining spaces, retail areas, and The Met Store.
The opening will coincide with The Costume Institute Benefit, widely known as The Met Gala®, scheduled for Monday, May 4, 2026. The Benefit provides essential annual funding for The Costume Institute, supporting exhibitions, publications, acquisitions, operations, and related Museum initiatives. Co-chairs and honorary chairs will be announced in the months leading up to the event.
The exhibition and Benefit are made possible by Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sánchez Bezos, with additional support from Saint Laurent and Condé Nast. The catalogue is also made possible by Saint Laurent.
The Museum will offer public programs tied to Costume Art throughout 2026. A fully illustrated catalogue, written by Bolton and featuring new work by artist Julie Wolfe, photographer Paul Westlake, and stylist, editor, and designer Nathalie Agussol, will accompany the exhibition, with an introduction by Dr. Llewellyn Negrin and an epilogue by Andrew Solomon. A limited-edition deluxe version will be available exclusively at The Met Store.