Doja Cat’s Two Met Gala Beauty Transformations Were Instant Classics

Whenever Doja Cat hits the red carpet, she raises the bar. Case in point: the rapper and singer has only been to two Met Galas, but both her fashion and beauty looks have cemented themselves as some of the most memorable to date. An ode to Karl Lagerfeld’s pet cat Choupette? Glam sascara tears? No one does it like Doja. So while we wait with bated breath for what she has up her sleeves for this year’s Met Gala’s theme of “Superfine: Tailoring Black Style,” we take a look back at the exclusive look Vogue got of her past appearances.

2023’s Ode to Choupette

Choupette didn’t make an appearance at the 2023 Met Gala honoring her beloved owner Karl Lagerfeld, but that didn’t mean we would be short of feline-like tributes on the red carpet. The best one of the night was none other than Doja Cat’s—and it was an instant classic for a Met debut.

Celebrity makeup artist Ernesto Casillas told Vogue that the goal for the makeup was to look less like a costume and something more elevated. “We wanted the makeup to read feline, but still soft and pretty,” he said. “Doja and I agreed that we needed to do a thin and delicate cat-inspired eyeliner.

To get the perfect cat-eye look, he used the appropriately named Charlotte Tilbury’s The Feline Flick liquid eyeliner and matched her lip color to her faux nose (“[A] small but endearing detail,” he said) with the Charlotte Tilbury Pillow Talk Collection on her lips and cheeks. The last detail of her beauty look included a jeweled “third eye” that had to be done for her first appearance at The Met.

“I mean, there’s a million-dollar diamond that’s just sitting in the middle of her forehead,” Brett Alan Nelson, Doja’s creative director and stylist, told Vogue. “It’s the most major art moment of the year. It’s her first Met Gala, and we need this to be bigger than what we’ve done in the past.”

2024’s Mascara Tears

For the 2024 Met Gala, Doja Cat went the more unconventional route. Instead of floral or green-inspired to match the night’s theme of Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion, she tapped into water elements and enlisted celebrity makeup artist Pat McGrath to create her look of bold mascara tears.

She debuted the look outside the Mark Hotel, wearing a towel wrapped around her head and her body. It gave “I-just-got-out-of-the-shower” meet ultra-glam vibes that everyone absolutely loved.

“We used glitter to paint shimmering, enchanted tears of joy streaming down her cheeks,” McGrath told Vogue. “On her lids, we created the most beautiful gilded cat-eyes using black pencil, black liquid liner, lots of mascara, and the warm scintillating shades in my Mothership V: Bronze Seduction palette. She looks absolutely major!”

For the red carpet, Doja Cat kept the tears and makeup but switched from her towel to an oversized T-shirt dress with a wet-like finish. Unique and bold, leave it to Doja to leave us wanting more of her beauty looks.

This article was originally published on Vogue.com.