Tickets this year are $30,000 apiece, and tables are about $275,000. The party and exhibition are sponsored. All of the money from ticket sales goes to the Costume Institute, which it needs because it is the only one of the Met’s curatorial departments that has to fund itself, fashion having been an iffy proposition as an art form when the Costume Institute was established. Last year, just over $12 million was raised. Of course, not everyone pays for a ticket. A brand will often invite celebrities to sit at its table, and Ms. Wintour also often invites up-and-coming designers who may not be able to afford a ticket and scatters them around the event. This makes them really excited and makes them feel like they owe her. If they didn’t already.

Why Would Anyone Pay That Much for a Party?Ms. Wintour, the editor of American Vogue and the artistic director of Condé Nast, first became chairwoman in 1995. She took over annual leadership in 1999. Since then, she has been instrumental in transforming a local philanthropic event into the ultimate global celebrity/power cocktail: Take a jigger of famous names from fashion, add film, politics and business, and mix.

It has become the gold standard of parties; that by which other benefits are measured. It’s such a heady combo that President Trump proposed to his wife, Melania, during the gala in 2004. (In case you are wondering: No, they are not expected this year.). It is among the hardest party tickets of the year to get — and thus, intensely coveted.

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How Many People Get to Go to the Party?Last year, about 550. But that was a more intimate event for a more intimate show, “Rei Kawakubo/Comme des Garçons: Art of the In-Between,” which was devoted to the cultlike Japanese designer who once said her goal with one collection was “not to make clothes.”

By contrast, “Heavenly Bodies” will be the biggest exhibition the Costume Institute has produced — about 58,600 square feet, stretching over three galleries: the Anna Wintour Costume Center and the medieval rooms in the Met on Fifth Avenue, and the Cloisters in far northern Manhattan — and odds are the gala will be equally ambitious.

If I Can Afford a Ticket, Can I Go?Dream on. Unlike other cultural fund-raisers, like the New York City Ballet gala or the Frick Collection Young Fellows Ball, the Met gala is invitation only, and there is a waiting list. Qualifications for inclusion have to do with buzz and achievement (and beauty), a.k.a. the gospel according to Anna, more than money. Ms. Wintour has final say over every invitation and attendee, which means that even if a company buys a table, it cannot choose everyone who sits at its table: It must clear the guest with her and Vogue and pray for approval.

O.K., You’re Saying I Can’t Go. So Why Should I Care?It’s reality TV at its most glamorous. See Tom and Gisele being much more perfect than any normal couple could hope to be! Check out Chelsea Clinton kissing Diane von Furstenberg! Watch Tom Ford try not to step on Sarah Jessica Parker’s train! Judge whether you approve of the outfits! (For the best view, tune in to our red carpet slide show, produced in real time as soon as the hosts make their entrance around 6 p.m.)

Content Courtesy  Of New York Times & Nairobi Fashion Hub