Lauren Sanchez’s blistering Met Gala message that will silence her critics… but threatens to expose her biggest insecurity: JANE TIPPETT

This was undoubtedly Lauren Sanchez Bezos’s ball. In the days leading up to the Oscars of haute couture, no one would talk about anything else except fashion’s newest and now most influential patrons.

Controversy abounded as to whether their $10 million buyout of an event once exclusively curated by Vogue matriarch Anna Wintour was appropriate – with the rumor mill in overdrive that many of the A-list regulars had opted of a party that felt less of a benefit for the Metropolitan Museum and more for Jeff’s wife of less than one year.

Though that worry proved to be unfounded – it was a bevy of international celebrity as usual – the injection of Amazon into the $100,000-a-ticket night elicited a further firestorm that has ensured the couple have felt the full headwinds of opposition – even down to the protests they encountered when attending Wintour’s pre gala bash on Saturday night.

A savvy and clearly clued-in woman – who doubtlessly keeps a vigilant eye on her own press, little of which is positive – LSB was on a mission to silence her critics and prove that she has earned and not just been given a place at fashion’s top table.

Striding into Monday morning’s press conference – demure in a houndstooth John Galliano vintage Dior dress – LSB looked more like a Madison Avenue lady who lunched than her usual dominatrix style persona with over the top trains, tightly laced corsets and bursting out bosoms that she has cultivated during her meteoric rise to fashion fame.

Clearly not convinced that the announcement just a few days ago that the Bezos Earth Fund was to donate $34 million in fashion grants would be enough to prove her charitable credentials, nor any other bold philanthropic pronouncements, it should perhaps not have been a surprise that a very different Mrs. Bezos arrived for the ‘First Monday in May.’

LSB knew she would be amongst a group who would exploit to the full the outlandish potential of the ‘Fashion is Art’ dress code. So, she zigged where the rest zagged.

Nicole Kidman clad in Chanel sequins and a misaligned feather-like tutu at her waist was an early example of how the once elegant soiree has turned into the most expensive Halloween party on the planet.

And Lena Dunham clearly not yet Famesick was out to astound in a custom Valentino asymmetrical dress embroidered with sequins and crow feathers that claimed to have been inspired by an Italian Baroque painting but instead looked more like a dollar store rug that had, albeit clearly misaligned, been wrapped around her body.

Even Anna Wintour jumped on the bandwagon of absurdity, donning a Chanel mint green ostrich cape that echoed the scale-like pattern of her floor length evening gown.

Having appeared last year in an Oscar de la Renta evening gown whose skirt was so wide one wondered how she would have ever fit through the museum door let alone sat down, LSB clearly realized that her mission this year was very different. Slinking onto the red carpet, notably solo, in a navy satin off the shoulder evening gown by the French couture house Schiaparelli (which has been ingeniously reinvented by creative director Daniel Roseberry) the wife of the world’s richest man looked as if she’d stepped into a time warp.

Forget the feathers or thrills, this was a throwback to a different era when the party of the year was in fact populated by New York socialites, visiting royalty and foreign aristocracy. In a shade that was not too dissimilar from the navy Dior slip dress that Princess Diana donned for her appearance in 1995, LSB clearly believed that this was night to wield the strength of subtlety.

Taking the dress code ‘Fashion is Art’ literally, the gown was intended as a homage to John Singer Sargent’s Madame X. One of the great society painters of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century – particularly notable for grand portraits of nouveau riche Americans – Sargent’s career had almost been ruined when his portrait of Louisiana-born socialite turned wife of a French banker, Madame Pierre Gautreau in a floor length black gown that clung curvaceously to her corseted figure was first exhibited in Paris in 1884. Already known for her exotic and artful appearances, Sargent’s decision to paint her shoulder strap slipping off her shoulder was a step too far. Eventually repainted so it sat upright – the sitter’s reputation accordingly saved – the image has now become iconic for both its beauty and as a reminder of the power of female fashion to offend.

My guess is that the painting, with the new Mrs. Bezos, undoubtedly struck a chord. Like all Sanchez Bezos looks, this one is clearly body conscious – her figure is always her most overt accessory – flaunting it with as much panache as her couture creations. And though she couldn’t resist a plunging neckline (though noticeably higher than some other iterations) and a laced-up bodice, this was an aspirational gown.

Finding herself under near constant criticism – not just for her bad taste in the many hundreds of thousands of dollars of her haute couture but on her threadbare credentials in the world of philanthropic giving – this was an opportunity to prove the pundits wrong. Not only did she know her art history, but she understood and dressed for the event that I think she would like this one to be in the future – one where elegance and the art of design are, rather than Halloween, the night’s theme.

In the waning days of Anna Wintour’s career, and with the leadership strength of the nepo-editor Chloe Malle (who showed up in a frightening yellow frills), LSB clearly knows there is a void to fill. And yet in what is her most demure red carpet appearance yet, this is a more insecure side of this powerhouse female figure than we have ever previously seen – one who is anxious to prove herself and her future in an industry she has clearly decided to call her own.

Yet even in the midst of this stab at sophistication – she manages to fail. Though the gown is incredibly cut, it would have perhaps been better suited on her co-chair Nicole Kidman who could have played out in full its Moulin Rouge-like theme. With a tall and angular figure like Kidman’s, the gown might have flowed more as Sargent would have wished – draping down dramatically from the heels of more statuesque silhouette.

Though clearly a serious collector of couture and one of Schiaparelli’s most important clients – a house where jackets can cost upwards of five figures and dress more like six – LSB has a long track record of misjudging what suits. She often misses the mark not because of the design itself but because what she wears does not in fact suit her shape.

Should she wish to become an international arbiter of taste, she would do well to step back, take stock and realize that dressing for who you are vs. who you think you are is not only the key to looking classic, but the currently missing ingredient in achieving the fashion fame to which she aspires.