Jeans at Met Gala 2026? Why Bavita Mandava’s Chanel Look Sparked So Much Debate

While audiences are used to extravagant, over-the-top gowns dominating fashion’s biggest night, Indian model Bavita Mandava challenged expectations. She arrived in a denim-inspired look and even described it on the red carpet in an interview with PEOPLE as “the most comfortable outfit anyone has ever worn to the Met.”

The 26-year-old Mandava is a New York University graduate who rose to prominence after being discovered by agent Shao Yin Bishop on a Brooklyn subway platform. In December of last year, she became the first Indian model to open a Chanel show (the Métiers d’Art 2026 presentation, also staged in a subway-inspired setting). Over the following months, she grew closer to the French fashion house and its creative director Mathieu Blazy, who designed her Met Gala look for the evening.

Her outfit carried a deeper symbolic meaning. It featured a beige muslin zip-up pullover, a white top, and muslin trousers printed to resemble denim. According to Mandava, the ensemble was a couture reinterpretation of the exact look she wore when she opened her first Chanel show — where she had actually been wearing real jeans. That original runway moment itself was inspired by what she was wearing the day she was first scouted.

Although the look appeared understated compared to the Met Gala’s typically dramatic fashion statements — and has already drawn criticism online for that reason — it was intended as a conceptual interpretation of the dress code “Fashion Is Art” and the evening’s theme “Costume Art.”

“When I saw the sketch, my breath was taken away, because that subway show was already one of the most important moments of my career,” Mandava told British Vogue. The outfit reportedly took 250 hours to create.

“To reinterpret that look for the Met Gala felt like carrying that memory forward in a more elevated form, while still respecting its original spirit and the theme of the evening.”