The Metropolitan Museum of Art will no longer proceed with its planned spring 2027 exhibition celebrating the career of British fashion designer John Galliano, bringing an abrupt end to a project announced only weeks earlier.

The exhibition, “John Galliano: Horizons,” had been scheduled as the Costume Institute’s major spring show and was expected to lead into the 2027 Met Gala. Had it gone ahead, Galliano would have become only the third living fashion designer to receive such an honour from the Costume Institute, following Yves Saint Laurent in 1983 and Rei Kawakubo in 2017.

The Met said the museum and Galliano had reached a mutual decision not to proceed with the retrospective. A new subject for the Costume Institute’s spring exhibition, along with the theme for the next Met Gala, is expected to be announced later.

Galliano addressed the decision publicly on Monday, saying that after extensive reflection and discussions with the museum and others involved, he believed the exhibition should not take place “at this time.”

“I remain fully accountable for the pain caused by my words in the past, particularly the hurt I caused to the Jewish and Asian communities, and I remain deeply sorry for it,” he said.

His statement also made clear that the decision was tied to the debate surrounding the planned retrospective. Galliano said he did not want the controversy to put the Met in a difficult position or divert attention from the work of the Costume Institute.

He also acknowledged that an exhibition honouring his career could itself be painful for some people.

A major retrospective that never reached the gallery

“John Galliano: Horizons” had been announced in July as the Costume Institute’s spring 2027 exhibition. The proposed show was designed to examine Galliano’s four-decade career through garments, accessories, sketches, toiles, research books and archival material.

Galliano, 65, has held senior creative roles at Givenchy, Dior and Maison Margiela, in addition to designing under his own label.

But the decision to dedicate one of the Met’s most prominent fashion exhibitions to him drew criticism because of remarks he made in 2010 and 2011, including antisemitic comments and slurs directed at Jewish and Asian people.

Galliano was dismissed from his position as Dior’s creative director, and a French court convicted him in 2011 of public insults constituting hate crimes.

The renewed attention on those events became inseparable from discussion of the exhibition itself.

In his statement, Galliano framed accountability as something continuing rather than something resolved by institutional recognition. He thanked Metropolitan Museum of Art director Max Hollein, Costume Institute curator Andrew Bolton and Anna Wintour, as well as people who had supported him through what he described as 15 years of sobriety and recovery from alcoholism and addiction.

Anna Wintour backs Galliano’s decision

Anna Wintour, a Met trustee and longtime supporter of Galliano’s work, publicly supported his choice to step away from the exhibition.

She described the decision as “very courageous and a measure of the man he is,” while continuing to praise Galliano’s contribution to fashion, particularly his technical skill, storytelling and work at Dior and Maison Margiela.

Her response is significant because Wintour had been closely associated with the project and remains one of Galliano’s most prominent supporters within the fashion world.

The cancellation leaves the Costume Institute with a major change to make ahead of its 2027 programme. The Met has not yet revealed what exhibition will replace “John Galliano: Horizons” or what theme will shape the accompanying Met Gala.

For now, the most definitive outcome is that Galliano’s planned retrospective will not proceed in its announced form. While his own language left open the possibility that such an exhibition might be reconsidered at another time, the Met has confirmed that a different spring exhibition subject will be announced.

What had been intended as an institutional survey of one of fashion’s most influential careers has instead become a reminder of how questions of artistic legacy, accountability and public recognition can collide long after the events that first shaped them.

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