Claire Danes’ Magical Glow-in-the-Dark Met Gown Required a Bus to Get Her to the Party

It felt like a true fairy-princess moment for Claire Danes on last night’s Met Gala red carpet. The actress wore a strapless Zac Posen gown, and while the creation would have been stunning no matter what, the real magic came when the lights switched off. The designer used a custom French organza woven with fiber optics for the sparkly effect and powered the entire thing with 30 mini battery packs sewn into the understructure of the gown. In total, the piece took 500 hours to make.

“I went through a sequence of stages throughout the process of draping this gown, playing with motion and structure to capture the emotional engineering. The gown is hollow underneath with no tulle, [so it’s] holding its own structure,” the designer said, calling it a “Galactic Cinderella” moment.

Fun fact: the dress’ size and structure made it so Danes had to take a bus to the Met, she said (though Posen’s team said the dress itself didn’t weigh any more than one of his non-lit creations). Check out the images below to see what she’s talking about.

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See all the red-carpet dresses from the Met Gala 2016.

Speaking of tricky fashion, watch Iskra Lawrence show you how to pull off challenging looks IRL: