The Costume Institute Has Been Renamed the Anna Wintour Costume Center
They say once your name gets afixed to a building, you’ve really made it; and in that case, Anna Wintour just made it big-time. The organization formerly known as The Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art—the locale for the annual fashion circus that is the Met Gala—will be renamed after the Vogue editor-in-chief. Its new nomenclature: the Anna Wintour Costume Center.
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“Anna Wintour’s extraordinary advocacy and fundraising have made this state-of-the-art space a reality,” Musem Chairman Daniel Brodsky said in a release. “She has the rare ability to rally diverse groups across a wide range of industries to support The Costume Institute so it can educate and inspire visitors from around the world.”
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From what we can gather from the release, the building is being named after Wintour more as a result of her financial contributions to the organization than anything else. She’s been a trustee of the Met since 1999, and in that 15-year span, according to the release, “she has raised approximately $125 million for The Costume Institute.” The new Costume Center will open May 8 with the glamorous “Charles James: Beyond Fashion” exhibit, just a few days after the Gala.
There is a bright tunnel at the end of this slightly perturbing news: as part of the Institute’s refurbishing, there will also be a wing called the Carl and Iris Barrel Apfel Gallery, named after one of our favorite style icons. As for whether or not the new designation of the building in Wintour’s name is a due honor, we might remain mum and just let this GIF do all the talking.
