Alexa Chung’s Met Gala Dress Was Inspired By Anne Boleyn And Claire Danes In "Romeo and Juliet"

Alexa Chung was feeling blessed ahead of last night’s Met Gala. “This is an actual Cinderella situation,” she said a few days ahead of her very personal red carpet moment. For the first time, Chung wore a dress that she designed herself under her one-year-old eponymous label. “It’s huge for me because I first attended the Met Ball as a guest of a designer in 2010,” she explains. “To fast-forward to this moment when I’m wearing a dress of my own design, from the company that I started, is thrilling.” The ethereal short white dress with Japanese lace trim was a true labour of love for Chung, who says that she was inspired by monarch portraits inside The National Gallery in London, as well as Anne Boleyn and “a little bit of Claire Danes in Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo and Juliet.”

The model and designer was careful not to take the Catholicism theme too seriously, or interpret it too literally. “The theme sounded fairly intimidating at first,” she admits. “It sort of evoked a seriousness and grandeur that isn’t necessarily within my comfort zone.” Chung and her team went back and forth between short and long silhouettes and whether or not to keep the dress white or to use brighter colour. “In the end, we kept it white because it was reminiscent of an altar boy smock,” Chung notes. “I think the theme created plenty of scope for playfulness.” She accessorised with colourful Buccellati rings that called the papal jewels to mind, as well as a pearl-encrusted choker and hair scrunchie. Though her shoes were Gucci, Chung designed her miniature bucket bag, which was embroidered with symbols of the Seven Deadly Sins. A cheeky nod from a cheeky and very chic girl: “It was too tempting not to have a little nod to vanity with me as I traversed the carpet,” she says.