Daily Times

Nicole Kidman and her husband, Keith Urban, were among the first celebrities to arrive inside the Great Hall at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on Monday for the Costume Institute benefit, honouring designer Karl Lagerfeld.

The couple was accompanied by Baz Luhrmann and his wife Catherine Martin.

For the cameras, Kidman, with her long, strawberry blond locks, in a swath of peachy fabric, seemed to float toward Luhrmann’s side, in front of a towering centrepiece featuring hundreds of one-litre plastic bottles sourced from a recycling plant.

The light of many flash bulbs reflected off the bottles, lighting Luhrmann’s face as he fluffed Kidman’s train, gesturing with his hands, softly, toward her face. Kidman, who starred in Luhrmann’s films “Moulin Rouge!” and “Australia,” poked her chin up, meeting the director’s hand in mid-air.

The role of muse is one Kidman knows well: She was also one of Lagerfeld’s muses, although she humbly deflected about the title when asked if she considered herself as such, preferring to talk about how much he taught her.

“I stood there, you know, in my lingerie while he designed my dress,” Kidman said about Lagerfeld, who died in 2019 at 85, as she exited the exhibition and headed to the cocktail party in the American Wing of the museum. She clutched the train of her dress, designed by Lagerfeld for a Chanel No. 5 commercial Luhrmann directed. “Karl knew me and he was able to design for me, but he was also really playful and fun. It was just lovely in the same way as being around someone like Stanley Kubrick.”

Supermodels like Kate Moss cherished the intimacy they shared with Lagerfeld. Moss recalled working with the designer, as well as his infamous largesse.

“To sit at the desk with Karl Lagerfeld as he sketched was the most incredible thing,” Moss said, as she entered the exhibit with her daughter, Lila Moss, wearing a Fendi dress. “He was so generous with his passion.”

Naomi Campbell, who walked in Lagerfeld’s runway shows and shot ad campaigns with him, also relished the bond she shared with Lagerfeld. As she walked through the exhibition, “Karl Lagerfeld: A Line of Beauty,” her knee-length dark hair contrasted with the stark white walls.

“If I could describe our relationship, it was fun, witty, intelligent, never a dull moment, so creative, risk-taking and caring,” she said, wearing a satin pink and silver Chanel dress from the 2010 couture collection. One thing she loved about Lagerfeld? “He was very honest: He did not suffer fools.”

Campbell is proud of having been Lagerfeld’s muse because it allowed her to watch him conceive an idea and bring it to life, she said.

“It is an honour to be a muse,” Campbell said while a man holding a satin pink purse that matched her dress on a pillow stood several feet away. “It’s an honour to be a part of, to watch something transpire and watch what it turns into.”

Unlike Campbell, Gisele Bündchen, who wore archival Chanel from the 2007 bridal collection, has never considered herself a muse. She felt too tomboyish to see herself in that context, but she has muses of her own, she said.

“My muse is my mom and my grandma because they are incredible women who show me the values that carry me throughout my life,” Bündchen said as she walked through the exhibit in a feathery white Chanel cape with a train that dragged a foot behind her and laid over a sequined white Chanel dress.

Oscar-nominated actor Bryan Tyree Henry said that he also considered his mother his muse. “My mother was my muse for most of my life, still is,” said Henry, who wore a collaborative piece from the Karl Lagerfeld bridal collection. “She was one of the most fashionable people I ever saw. From her jewellery to her rings or shoes, I was enamoured with everything that she picked and how she walked in this world.”

Designer Tom Ford believes muses are important, even more so for male designers of women’s clothes. “Oh my God, I have so many muses,” Ford said as he walked past a row of servers in white tuxedos and away from the bar, fizzy drink in hand. “I would say I have two main muses, Carine Roitfeld and Lisa Eisner. They represent very different sides of my own personal taste and both were quite different.”

While Ford can narrow it down to two women, Nigerian singer Tems, who wore a feathered Robert Wun gown, said she finds creative inspiration in everyone.

“We gain inspiration from everybody – it’s a universal thing,” Tems said, while chatting with Gabrielle Union, who wore a red Prada get-up. “We are all connected. You can see somebody right now and then you gain inspiration from that. We are all muses in our own right, whether we know it or not.”