Choupette Lagerfeld Will Attend the Met Gala, Thank God

This is genuinely the most excited I’ve been for a Met Gala appearance in ages. Choupette Lagerfeld, pampered feline daughter of the late Chanel designer Karl Lagerfeld, will attend the benefit function as it honors her former human parent.

“Karl Lagerfeld: A Line of Beauty” is the theme for 2023, honoring the controversial German fashion icon’s work at Chanel, Fendi, Balmain and other brands. Lagerfeld, who passed away in 2019, famously named the kitty in his will, and she has been pampered—and represented by an agent—ever since. (Lagerfeld’s former housekeeper apparently does the actual day-to-day cat stuff.)

Choupette first came into Lagerfeld’s life in 2012, when he reportedly kitten-sat for his friend Baptiste Giabiconi, the model, over the 2011–2012 holidays. He and the kitten grew close, and Giabiconi let Lagerfeld keep her. She soon became something of a media sensation, with her official Instagram and unofficial parody Twitter garnering tens of thousands of followers. People were entranced by her fluffy white fur and bright blue eyes, and by her luxurious lifestyle, which included meals of king crab and caviar. She was the subject of a book and of a Shu Uemura ad campaign. In 2015, reports the BBC, Brigitte Bardot wrote a letter “to Choupette” asking her to “purr in the ear” of Lagerfeld to get him to stop using fur in his designs, and Chanel became the first major fashion house to go fur-free.

Okay, I know, but what you have to remember is that in the 2010s, people were absolutely obsessed with internet cats. It was a huge, huge thing. And while Choupette was never actually more famous than Grumpy Cat, she was certainly the most high-class of the web-famous felines. And Karl truly loved her. I highly recommend this Q&A he did about her that he took very seriously.

Anyway, there will be a cat at the Met Gala!!!!!!! Unclear yet who among Lagerfeld’s nearest and dearest will be entrusted to hold her on the carpet, but I hope it’s Naomi Campbell.