Australian billionaire Anthony Pratt made a surprise appearance at the 2024 MET Gala in New York City on Monday evening.
Known in Australia as “The Cardboard King’, Pratt, 64, made sure to follow the theme of the night, turning up to the event in a fluorescent pink blazer emblazoned with sparkly detailing.
The jacket was embroidered with a recycling logo and the words ‘100% Recycled’ which is believed to be a nod to his efforts to increase sustainability within Australia’s packaging industry.
To complete his over the top outfit, Pratt appeared to run out of ideas and settled on sporting… crocs, to one of the most glamorous events of the year.
Pratt didn’t go unnoticed, with many Met fans on Twitter questioning who the “man in the pink” was that kept appearing in the backs of pictures of celebrities.
One Aussie teased: “Great to see Anthony Pratt attending the Met Gala dressed as a leprechaun.”
Pratt wasn’t the only Aussie to hit the red carpet on Monday night, with the likes of Troye Sivan, Nicole Kidman and Chris Hemsworth wowing the crowds.
This year’s Met hosts included an Aussie in their mix: Zendaya, Jennifer Lopez, Bad Bunny and none other than Australian action man Hemsworth.
Inspired by J.G. Ballard’s short story of the same title, The Garden of Time is one of the more open-ended themes we’ve seen from the Gala in recent years.
“This exhibition broke my cardinal rule,” Anna Wintour confessed. “When we came up with the title ‘Sleeping Beauties,’ it’s wonderful and poetic and romantic, but actually, it could be many, many things.”
“I said, ‘What are we gonna say to people to wear to this night?’ And he [Costume Institute curator, Andrew Bolton] said, ‘Well, what about ‘Garden of Time?’” Wintour recalled. “So, I fear that we’ve unleashed a lot of confusion out there, and for which I deeply apologise. ““The idea of ‘Sleeping Beauties’ is taking these masterpieces from different periods, and because so many of them are very fragile, they are laid flat behind glass walls,” Wintour shared.