NEW YORK, NY.- The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s renowned Costume Institute Benefit – the annual black-tie dinner to benefit the Museum’s Costume Institute – took place on May 4, 2009, celebrating the exhibition The Model as Muse: Embodying Fashion, which will be on view from May 6 through August 9.

The stars were out in full force showing the latest in fashion. Brooke Shields, Gisele Bundchen, Madonna, Cindy Crawford, Helena Christensen, Katy Perry. Bono, Kanye West, Heidi Klum, Lauren Hutton, Justin Timberlake all were at the red carpet posing for photographers.

Dinner guests arrived at the Metropolitan Museum at 7:00 p.m. for an inaugural viewing of the exhibition and cocktails in the Museum’s Carroll and Milton Petrie European Sculpture Court. Dinner followed at around 8:30 p.m. at The Temple of Dendur in The Sackler Wing.

Rising from a pedestal in the center of the Great Hall and towering over the guests there was “The Muse,” a 6-foot-tall mannequin perched atop a tall urn that is surrounded at its base by hundreds of white roses. The tableau, illustrating how the designer drapes a model, shows The Muse in the process of creation, with “miles” of beige and gray fabric wrapped around her and flowing outward. The display is the creation of Marc Jacobs and his studio for the evening gala. Julien d’Ys created her huge, fanciful wig.

The decor for the evening was inspired by the nightclub El Morocco, a Manhattan institution and magnet for glamour that had its heyday in the 1930s through 1950s. A zebra carpet with red trim led the guests from the entrance through the Great Hall and up the Museum’s grand staircase to The Tisch Galleries for the inaugural viewing of the exhibition The Model as Muse: Embodying Fashion, then to the Petrie Court for cocktails and to The Temple of Dendur for dinner.

Guests found themselves in a modern evocation of El Morocco, with zebraupholstered dinner banquettes, palm trees, and white roses on the tables and around the room. Projections swathed the walls with blue light and stars. As guests entered, Beryl Diamond and Orion Music performed music of the El Morocco era onstage.

El Morocco inspired the evening’s menu, which began with avocado with crabmeat ravigote, shrimp tropicale, and lobster salad El Morocco. This first course was served with Chalk Hill Sauvignon Blanc, Sonoma County 2008. The entrée was tournedos Rossini with broiled tomato persillée, sautéed spinach and pommes gaufrettes, served with Raymond Cabernet Sauvignon, napa Valley 2005. Baked Alaska and cherries jubilee were served for dessert with coffee.

During the dinner, Metropolitan Museum of Art Director Thomas P. Campbell and the lead singer of U2, Bono, introduced Kanye West, who performed three songs.

Tables for the dinner, which had been sold out for several months, ranged in price from $75,000 to $250,000.

Marc Jacobs served as Honorary Chair of the gala benefit. Co-chairs were model Kate Moss, singer Justin Timberlake, and Anna Wintour, editor-in-chief of Vogue.

The Model as Muse exhibition explores the reciprocal relationship between high fashion and evolving ideals of beauty, focusing on iconic fashion models and their roles in projecting, and sometimes inspiring, the fashion of their respective eras. Following a timeline of fashion from 1947 to 1997, it looks at the power of clothing, fashion photography, and the model to project the look of an era. With a mere gesture, a truly stellar model can sum up the attitude of her time – becoming not only a muse to designers or photographers, but a muse to a generation. Eighty masterworks of haute couture and ready-to-wear plus fashion editorial, advertising, and runway photography as well as large-scale projections from feature films contextualize the fashion zeitgeist.

The Model as Muse: Embodying Fashion will be on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art from May 6 through August 9, 2009.