Last night in New York was that always-delightful high point of every fashionista’s calendar o’ chic: the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute Gala.  This year’s theme (in conjunction with the Costume Institute’s major annual exhibition of the same title)?  The Model as Muse: Embodying Fashion.

While last year’s Superhero show only produced a few interesting footwear choices, this year, there were beautiful shoes galore!

This may well be the year of Nicholas Kirkwood.  It certainly was on the carpet last night.  In my opinion, the most interesting designs were his, and they were on the feet of some of the top models in the industry.

Here’s Jessica Stam in the S9051B.

  

 

And here’s Karolina Kurkova so considerately displaying the S9049A for us.

  

Check out the official site for stockists near you and a peek at the GORGEOUS, uber-glam styles for the spring/summer 09 line.

 

While Kirkwood was my favorite on the carpet, there were plenty more style statements made through shoes.

Louboutins were everywhere… of course!

I’m not sure I’m feeling the giant bow look (seen here on Ivanka Trump with her Bow T pumps, which you can find at Joseph here), but I’ll tell you I do love her dress.

  

 

The so-called hourglass heels from Louis Vuitton that Twinkletoes wrote about so amusingly during Paris Fashion Week earlier this year were EVERYWHERE last night!  And I do mean everywhere.

Madonna wore a crazed thigh-high boot version.

 

Posh went with the ankle straps.

 

And Gossip Girl’s Leighton Meester took the cake for Walking Disaster in the covered ankle bow-tie version.  I hasten to add that the shoes are BY FAR the best part of this outfit, and that Walking Disaster status is earned by that horrible piece of—I hate to even call it fashion—fabric she has covered herself in that is an awful combination of rejected upholstery, spangles, and some American Apparel red lamé leggings.  XOXO?  I think not.

  

 

But we can’t end on such a hideous note, can we?  No no.  I wouldn’t do that to you.

So instead, I will end with a beautiful shoe that I totally covet.  It’s Roger Vivier’s origami-inspired Kyte in a beautiful ivory/gold combination that matches Marisa’s dress perfectly.  Mwah!

  

 

All in all, a beautiful batch of shoes full of interesting heels and toes and uppers and materials.  It’s going to be a fun season, folks.  Can’t wait for it to unroll.

 

(Celeb photos courtesy of Celebutopia and StyleFrizz.)