The 2016 Met Gala red carpet: Fashion meets technology at star-studded soirée

Didn't score an invitation to the Metropolitan Museum of Art's annual Costume Institute gala last night? That's OK; neither did anyone else who isn't fashion royalty or (at the very least) Rihanna-level famous.

The Met Gala is, by and large, the most exclusive party of the year in New York City, one that requires a personal invitation approved by Vogue's Anna Wintour to attend, regardless of whether you can afford a $30,000 US ticket.

Some call it "the Super Bowl of fashion," or "fashion prom," while publicist Paul Wilmot refers to the event as "an ATM for the Met." With more than $12.5 million raised for the museum's Costume Institute last year alone, he's not entirely wrong.  

Still, "the Oscars of fashion" is what you'll hear most in discussions about the Met Gala, because in some ways it is — minus the actual award show part, and with wilder couture outfits.
Co-chaired by Wintour, Taylor Swift, Idris Elba, and Apple's chief design officer, Jonathan Ive, the theme of this year's gala was more about looking forward than looking back upon the Costume Institute's roughly 35,000 pieces spanning seven centuries of fashion.

They called it "Manus x Machina: Fashion in an Age of Technology" a theme that some guests took more literally than others.

From chainmail gowns to Madonna's butt, the red carpet saw saw more than its fair share of head-turning looks this year. Replay our live blog below to see more of how celebrities, style icons, politicians and tycoons interpreted the 2016 Met Gala's futuristic theme.

As the Met Gala's long-running chair, Anna Wintour is one of the first to arrive. The editor kept her ensemble relatively low key for a tech-themed event, but we can assume (or at least hope) that this is to keep focus on the red carpet cyborgs we're about to see.