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The Met Gala is returning — twice. Here are all the details

The Metropolitan Museum of Art is planning two Met Gala events — one in September and one next May.
The 2019 Met Gala Celebrating Camp: Notes on Fashion - Arrivals
Last year's Met Gala event was postponed due to the pandemic. This year, it's returning in a big way.Neilson Barnard / Getty Images
/ Source: TODAY

Fashion's biggest night out is about to make a major comeback.

After being postponed indefinitely due to the pandemic last year, the annual Met Gala will return this September, with plans for a second celebration already in place for the following year.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art made the announcement Monday and revealed that the Costume Institute’s next major exhibition will be a two-part show.

The first exhibit, titled "In America: A Lexicon of Fashion," will commemorate the Costume Institute's 75th anniversary and will "explore a modern vocabulary of American fashion," according to a press release. It opens Sept. 18, and to drum up excitement, a "more intimate" Met Gala event will take place Sept. 13, pending COVID-19 government guidelines.

The event is typically a grand, star-studded affair with attendees representing the fashion, acting and music communities. Otherwise known as the Costume Institute Benefit, the Met Gala always has a theme and celebrities come dressed to impress in stunning ensembles.

The second exhibit, titled "In America: An Anthology of Fashion," will open May 5, 2022, and explore "the development of American fashion by presenting narratives that relate to the complex and layered histories of those spaces," the release said. The Met Gala for this exhibit will take place on May 2, 2022.

Both exhibitions will close Sept. 5, 2022.

“This two-part exhibition will consider how fashion reflects evolving notions of identity in America and will explore a multitude of perspectives through presentations that speak to some of the complexities of history with powerful immediacy. In looking at the past through this lens, we can consider the aesthetic and cultural impact of fashion on historical aspects of American life," Max Hollein, the Marina Kellen French director of The Met, said in a statement.

According to Andrew Bolton, the Wendy Yu curator in charge of the Costume Institute, this year's event is particularly timely since the pandemic has made our connections to our clothing more emotional.

"For American fashion, this has meant an increased emphasis on sentiment over practicality. Responding to this shift, Part One of the exhibition will establish a modern vocabulary of American fashion based on the expressive qualities of clothing as well as deeper associations with issues of equity, diversity, and inclusion," he said in a statement. "Part Two will further investigate the evolving language of American fashion through a series of collaborations with American film directors who will visualize the unfinished stories inherent in The Met’s period rooms.”

Last year's event was canceled due to the pandemic, but many people still celebrated at home. Vogue magazine even invited readers to re-create their favorite Met Gala looks using the hashtag #MetGalaChallenge. Celebrities also took to social media to share throwback photos of their favorite Met Gala memories.