Lewis Hamilton Changes Lanes With Met Gala Co-Chair Role

With a new Dior collection and a job as co-chair for the 2025 Met Gala, the Formula One star has been making moves into the world of high fashion.

It’s a brisk Thursday night on London’s Bond St, and Mayfair is filled with hordes of hysterical Gen-Zers fizzing with excitement, camera phones aloft, outside the Dior flagship store. It’s the imminent arrival of Sir Lewis Hamilton that they’re giddy about; the F1 champion is launching his own collaboration with the storied Parisian house and as he arrives, the screams intensify.

Perhaps more than any other sportsman today, Hamilton has become a veritable rock star way beyond the confines of the race track. As he approaches his 40th birthday, his fashion status has been secured by two major announcements this week – that he will join Anna Wintour and Pharrell Williams as a co-chair of next year’s prestigious Met Gala, and the launch of his debut collection for Dior, designed in collaboration with menswear artistic director Kim Jones.

Arriving at the latter’s launch event wearing a severe black ensemble featuring a jacket with jagged yellow motifs, Hamilton says that he’s more comfortable than ever in these high fashion environs, and more secure in his own look too.

“I said ‘yes’ immediately,” he admits of the moment Jones got in touch about working together. “I’ve always been a big fan of Kim’s work.” British designer Jones is perhaps the UK’s most prolific fashion designer working today – he runs Dior Men and until recently the Italian house of Fendi. The process of creating the collection was more involved than just applying his name to something, insists Hamilton.

He clearly has relished the role of co-designer – the resulting designs sit somewhere between Courchevel ski savant and California surfing dude; tufted fleeces in fluorescent, painterly splodges, sporty cagoules and puffa jackets.

“It was hands-on, which wasn’t easy when you travel as much as I do,” he says. “I really immersed myself in this process, we would meet up in person as much as possible and when I was on the road we would have a group chat to constantly share ideas, inspiration and feedback. Kim and his team offered their experience and talent to help shape my creativity.”

The offer of a collaboration with one of the world’s most important maisons makes sense, given Hamilton’s evolution in the fashion world and his palpable enthusiasm for self-expression.

The lad from Stevenage has, in recent years, become one of the most experimental figures in men’s fashion. With his ascent to the position of record-breaking Formula One force since he began his racing career in 2001, so too has his style become more outre and daring.

“When I first started out in F1 I felt a lot of pressure to conform but, over the years, I began to feel more comfortable in how I styled myself,” he admits. Early photos of Hamilton when he first started garnering attention show him in polite blazers and everyman skinny jeans, looking like any average 20-year-old on a night out.

“In my early 20s I had the opportunity to go to a fashion show in Paris for the first time and I was just blown away by the whole experience and amazing energy – it really inspired me to start expressing myself fully through fashion.”

Express himself he has, and then some; some hifalutin highlights include riotous print and pattern, Brigadoon explosions of tartan, stardust sprinklings of jewellery, more brocade and embroidery than the court of Louis XIV, and arresting streetwear designs.

He’s been a fixture on the Met Gala red carpet for the past five years, wearing some of his most daring ensembles, including a Kenneth Nicholson suit with tulle skirt cascading in a train and, this year, a sweeping black Burberry embroidered coat and necklace of spiked thorns.

He’s been zealous in giving young designers of colour a platform too, wearing pieces by emerging talents such as Theophilio, Jason Rembert and Ahluwalia to high-profile public events.

It’s particularly impressive, and inspiring to a younger generation, that he’s chosen to toy with stylistic convention in the ultra-machismo world of motor racing. Not for him the standard leather racing jacket.

He didn’t always have such confidence, though, he explains. Growing up in Hertfordshire, and a competitive junior racer since 1998, at the age of 13, his desire was to fit in rather than stand out.

“When I was younger I was really inspired by hip-hop culture and expressing myself through those kind of looks,” he says. “But at the same time, I was trying to make it in racing and that sort of style wasn’t really accepted in that world.

“I thought it was important to fit in and so that’s what I tried to do,” he continues. “As I got older and started to have success in Formula 1, I went on this journey, worrying less about getting approval from others and instead discovering what actually works for me.”

Hamilton is fond of kilts and famously wore a blue-checked Burberry one at the 2021 Turkish Grand Prix. Perhaps it’s a sartorial form of atonement for a misstep he made years ago in 2017, when he mocked his young nephew for wearing a dress on social media, saying “Boys don’t wear princess dresses!” in a video that he swiftly took down and apologised for.

Hamilton went on to appear in a skirt on the cover of British GQ declaring, “I want to make amends.” Today, he appears as happy in a princessy confection of lace as he is in precise tailoring.

His chameleon approach is undoubtedly what has caught American Vogue editor Anna Wintour’s eye – Hamilton said it was an “honour” to have been selected to join her as a chair of one of the most-watched red carpet parades in the world. The theme he will preside over is a pertinent one: “Superfine: Tailoring Black Style,” a look at the influence of black dandyism in fashion.

“I love fashion but I’ve found that authenticity is the most important thing,” Hamilton says of his ethos when getting dressed. “It’s not about following trends but about really appreciating the art that these designers create. I think the key to creating style is working out what makes you feel good. If you have the confidence in what you’re wearing you’ll always look great.”

Rather than being a distraction from his sport, Hamilton says that clothes in fact help him feel ready for a race. Crafting the image of Lewis Hamilton to go out in front of the crowds and streak into pole position, he’s been known to wear vivid hues and bold jewellery to compete. “The looks I wear to the track now are like my superpower,” he considers. “They allow me to show up as myself and that’s such a powerful feeling.”

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