At this year’s Met Gala, A$AP Rocky wore a quilt by Eli Russell Linnetto to the affair. But there’s a surprising story of how it came to be.
Putting together a fabulous Met gala look is an art form. If you’re lucky enough to climb the steps of the Metropolitan Museum of Art at the Met Gala, you’re obliged to bring the theatrics.
At this year’s Met Gala, A$AP Rocky was in attendance with rumoured partner, Rihanna. It wasn’t her Balenciaga outfit that created the most commotion, however. This year, she was upstaged by her date – wearing a vintage quilt.
According to The Guardian, the designer behind the piece explains that A$AP Rocky “gravitated to a giant quilt in the ERL spring collection” during a visit to his studio.
One Week Later
ERL designer Eli Russell Linnetz was responsible for the custom silk taffeta tuxedo which Rocky wore under the quilt. In an article following the event, he tells Vogue that he found the vintage quilt at a thrift store.
One week later, Instagram user ‘books_n_babies’ looks to Instagram to post about the quilt.
“So my great grandmothers quilt was donated to an antique/thrift store a while back. When I saw the #metgalaPhoto I realized instantly that it had to be the same quilt.
She explains reading a Vogue article about the quilt,
I read the vogue article about the designer finding the quilt in Southern California and with his office not that far from us in Venice California, I demanded that my mom go look for the photos of it on our old bed. Looks like great grandma Mary went to the #metgala with @asaprocky and @erl__________ they wrote a @voguemagazine article too ?”
The post soon went viral. Shortly thereafter, some users falsely accused Linnetz of stealing the quilt – which he’d purchased from a thrift store.
In a follow-up post, Sarah confirms her motivation for sharing the story.
“Thank you very much everyone for all of the interest and kind comments. I have included more photos that my mother took of the quilt before it was donated. I am only posting this because I wanted to clarify that we aren’t accusing anyone of stealing this and we don’t want money.”
she adds, “I posted this because I found it amazing that some thing that my great grandmother made out of love for my mother,to be used to keep her warm ,and was donated so that it might keep somebody else warm or sold to raise funds for a lovely charity, ended up being used for an amazing statement art piece by amazingly talented people who took it to the next level.”
Foster believes that Sarah’s quilt is, indeed, the quilt in question, “McCall’s made a quilt pattern in 1978 and so we’ve seen a handful of these quilts surface in the last couple weeks, but given that Sarah was able to describe in detail parts of the quilt, coupled with the fact that her family in San Pedro had recently donated it to a thrift store, it adds up enough for me.”
And he was very excited to discover the connection.
“Generations of quilters never signed their work and therefore the maker and their story was easily separated from the work itself. It’s so rare to track down the original maker, but given the high-visibility of this particular piece, it’s been a real joy to witness.”
Character Building
According to Foster, the quilt makes for a significantly more stunning piece because the original quilt had character built up over a long period of time. It was faded and squashed in certain places, but it emitted an energy that couldn’t have been replicated.
Foster says that,
“Knowing the roots can help us preserve memories, keep stories intact, remember loved ones and heal our grieving.”
Source: Paper Magazine
Subscribe to FIB’s Weekly Breaking News Report for your weekly dose of music, fashion and pop culture news!