Isha Ambani stuns in 1,800-carat diamond blouse, carries a $100,000 bag; Karan Johar–Manish Malhotra turn heads

It was a night filled with funky fashion at the Met Gala 2026. From Beyoncé, Madonna, and the Kardashians, Hollywood and Bollywood celebrities amped up the glam quotient as they set the red carpet ablaze with their looks.

At the Met Gala 2026, this year’s theme is costume as art. Designers painted, jewels spoke, and silhouettes carried centuries and more than Hollywood our Indians shone bright.

From industry royalty to new-age disruptors, Karan Johar, Manish Malhotra, Natasha Poonawalla, Ananya Birla, Mona Patel, Sudha Reddy, Gauravi Kumari, Sawai Padmanabh Singh, Diya Mehta, and Bhavitha Mandava set the red carpet ablaze.

Manish Malhotra

Manish Malhotra wore his own bandhgala and an artisan-signed cape, focusing on the hands that build the spectacle. Crafted over 960 hours by a team of 50 artisans across Delhi and Mumbai, the cape stood out for both its scale and detail. Traditional Indian techniques such as dori work, zardozi, chikankari, and kasab embroidery were used in a subtle palette of white and ivory.

Filmmaker Karan Johar made his Met Gala 2026 debut in a Manish Malhotra ensemble, which drew inspiration from the paintings of Raja Ravi Varma, honouring this edition’s theme of “Costume Art.”

The ensemble celebrates some of Raja Ravi Varma’s most iconic works, such as Hamsa Damayanti, Kadambari, Arjuna and Subhadra, and There Comes Papa.

The largely black garment is dominated by hand-painted detailing executed in gold by traditional artisans, applied directly onto the garment as a painter would work on canvas.

His Met Gala debut, Karan Johar said, had to feel personal: “I didn’t want to arrive here trying to explain India. I wanted to arrive feeling like myself, and that automatically brings everything I come from with it… And the moment it felt personal, it became Indian, because that’s where everything I know comes from. Every story I’ve told, every film I’ve made, every emotion I’ve tried to put on screen has come from this place,” said the director, who made his filmmaking debut with Kuch Kuch Hota Hai in 1998, in a statement.

To embody Raja Ravi Varma’s works felt natural.

“Raja Ravi Varma felt right because his work does something I’ve always tried to do in cinema. Ravi Varma painted feelings. The way a sari falls, the way a figure holds itself, the light on a face that is somehow both divine and completely human. I’ve grown up with those images without always knowing it. They live in you before you can name them. This look is my way of wearing that inheritance, and I think that’s the most honest thing I could have done for my first MET. To arrive not with a concept, but with a feeling I’ve carried my whole life and finally found the right form for,” he added.

Karan Johar spoke about SRK.

Speaking at the red carpet, he said, “Well, for me it’s so emotional. Shah Rukh is such a large part of my career repertoire. I’ve done my first five films with him and he’s the reason I stand here today. So for him to have come last year and me this year, it’s like life feels like a complete circle.”

Ananya Birla

Ananya Birla’s Met Gala look was a display of sharp tailoring and avant-garde drama, built around a sculpted hourglass silhouette. The ensemble featured a structured black blazer-style bodice that cinched at the waist and flared into a pronounced peplum, flowing into a voluminous, floor-length pleated skirt crafted in a high-shine fabric that caught the light with movement. A crisp light blue shirt detail peeked through at the collar and cuffs, breaking the monochrome palette.

Her structured black couture outfit by Robert Wun was styled by Rhea Kapoor. The highlight of her ensemble was a metallic mask created by artist Subodh Gupta. It featured an intricate, industrial-inspired design with layered, sculptural detailing that obscured identity and transformed the look into wearable art.

Isha Ambani

Where luxury meets fashion, Isha Ambani attended the Met Gala 2026 in her signature style, shining in diamonds. Dressed in a Gaurav Gupta saree. The highlight of her look was her diamond-studded blouse, which had over 1800 carats of diamonds, alongside emeralds, polki, and kundan, embedded into the garment.

The blouse was paired with a gold tissue saree, the border of which was hand-painted by artisans from Swadesh. The look was completed with a sculptural resin-draped cape forming a halo around the body, created by folding the gold tissue saree into a preserved, fluid structure,  transforming the textile into sculpture.

But what stole attention was her unconventional accessory, a mango-shaped bag. The piece was actually a sculptural art object she has owned for around two decades.

It reportedly costs about $100,000, according to the Truss Archive Instagram page.

Speaking about her look, Isha said, “The blouse is full of my mother’s jewellery pieces.”

What the designer wrote about her outfit

“Over 1800 carats of diamonds, alongside emeralds, polki and kundan, are embedded into the garment (the blouse), transforming it into a living surface of inheritance and form,” designer Gaurav Gupta wrote in an Instagram post.

Netizens were quite upset seeing the absence of Priyanka Chopra, SRK, Diljit Doshajh, Alia Bhatt, Deepika Padukone, among other mainstream celebs.