Bianca Censori’s Naked Grammys Dress: How Fashion Experts Reacted

The most-talked-about fashion moment from the 2025 Grammys red carpet on Sunday, February 2, wasn’t caused by clothes, but rather lack thereof.

Bianca Censori, Kanye West‘s wife, wore a naked dress so revealing, many people wondered if the ensemble could be considered indecent exposure.

Although Censori, 30, arrived in a long shaggy black coat, moments after stepping in front of photographers, she removed her outerwear to expose the look underneath: a skintight, flesh-colored minidress so transparent, it left nothing to the imagination, as it exposed her completely from head to toe.

The couple’s display was clearly carefully orchestrated, as Ye, 47, previously shared photos of them rehearsing the coat-drop moment via Instagram. Some opined that it was an attempt to recreate the album cover for Vultures 1, while others theorized that it was a throwback to ex-Playboy model Rita G’s cameo in the rapper’s “Flashing Lights” music video, as in one scene, she is depicted removing a similarly long coat to reveal nothing but lingerie underneath.

Whatever the reason, the pair promptly left before the ceremony — only to emerge later at an after-party to pack on the PDA, where Censori wore a second look — this time, a sheer black thong bodysuit from West’s new womenswear label, Yzy. Following the viral Grammys appearance, West announced that the collection was up for sale on Monday, February 3.

“First women’s piece,” he captioned the Instagram post.

But it was Censori’s red-carpet look, a “custom couture” piece, according to West, that dominated headlines, as he was quick to point out with screenshots of the spike in searches for “Bianca Censori Grammys” which surpassed “2025 Grammy winners” by a mile; it also trumped queries for Chappell Roan, Benson Boone and Kendrick Lamar, among other artists.

“My wife is the most Googled person on the planet called Earth,” West declared via Instagram on Tuesday, February 4. He even gushed: “We beat the Grammys.”

Indeed, the shock value of the couple’s red-carpet stunt outshined the ceremony performances as well as Paris Fashion Week, which led to a number of experts speaking out on what made the latest in a long line of Censori’s naked looks oh-so-influential.

“I think the pearl-clutching about Bianca being naked is overblown and probably what she and Kanye were trying to get at in the first place,” wrote The Washington Post Style Reporter Shane O’Neill in an article published Monday, February 3.

“Functionally, there is very little that is different about what she wore compared with what was worn by Chrissy Teigen or Willow Smith,” O’Neill added, referring to the Christian Siriano design Teigen, 39, wore featuring a lingerie-inspired lace bodysuit with a ball skirt; and Smith, 24, who turned heads in a custom bedazzled Fleur du Mal bustier and matching briefs.

O’Neills colleague, Anne Branigin, pointed out the extreme distinction between “West’s coverage and Bianca’s nakedness.” Ye wore head-to-toe black in a simple T-shirt and trousers, which may seem insignificant, but as Branigin explained, everything down to his blacked-out sunglasses seemed to make a statement that said: “Women are offered up for consumption.”

This is hardly the first time we have seen similar sartorial distinctions at play between Ye and his other half, from ex-wife Kim Kardashian to ex-girlfriends Amber Rose and Julia Fox. As O’Neil put it: “He has a way of propping up his partner’s bodies while simultaneously hiding behind them.”

Branigin agreed, adding: “The outfit, in isolation, truly doesn’t warrant much more than that.” The Washington Post style reporter also explained that while it seems unlikely, if not unfair, to assume that Censori was not a willing and active co-conspirator in the “invisible dress,”  but the “obvious power dynamics between them on the red carpet spoke volumes.”

Unlike most public displays of undress that rely on suggestion and titillation, like a striptease, Censori’s nudity is direct and stark. The complete absence of any underwear, or its use as outerwear, removes any pretense of hidden allure.

Other experts were remind Us that exhibitionism is hardly considered a novel idea, as naked dresses have been percolating on the red carpet, on the runways and in real life for decades. In fact, journalist and New Yorker contributor Anthony Haden-Guest once wrote that model Grace Jones showed up fully nude at the nightclub Studio 54 so much that it became “a bore.”

Perhaps the continued interest around Censori is because we’ve never heard her speak (not including her impromptu karaoke performance at a post-Grammys party, where Instagram videos of her were posted singing along to hits by Adele).

However, much has been said about West, who has been accused of modeling Censori into a replica of ex-wife Kardashian, much like he did when dating Fox, now 35, immediately following his divorce in 2022. Fox later described their brief fling in detail.

“I learned very quickly that I was being weaponized,” she claimed while speaking to the Los Angeles Times in 2023. “I just felt like his little puppet.” During the start of their relationship, as part of an article written for Interview magazine, Fox alleged that West had “transformed’ her wardrobe just days after their first meeting.” That meant the rapper gave her “hotel suite full of new clothes” following their second date, and soon after, convinced her to get rid of almost all of her “old clothes.”

On a 2012 episode of Keeping Up With the Kardashians, then-boyfriend West and stylist Renelou Pandora gave Kardashian’s closet a similar makeover, piling her shoes up to the ceiling. “I started crying,” she later revealed while appearing on Live With Kelly and Michael in 2015.

That same season, we found out that in addition to wardrobe overhauls, West sent his wife lengthy trend memos as well. “[Kanye] sent me a whole email, like, ‘You cannot wear big glasses anymore. It’s all about tiny little glasses,’” Kardashian told sister Kourtney Kardashian and Jonathan Cheban in the episode. “He sent me, like, millions of ’90s photos with tiny little glasses,” she said while sporting a petite pair of shades Ye picked out.

Professionally, Censori began working for West’s brand Yeezy in November 2020. The architectural designer had recently relocated to the United States from Melbourne, Australia According to her LinkedIn profile, Censori was still an architecture student when she co-launched a jewelry line, Nylons, with a friend.

Considering that Censori was already interested in fashion before meeting West, others experts, like the London Evening Standard’s Maddy Mussen, suggested that her characteristically bold and bare style choices were part of her aesthetic before the rapper ever entered the picture. Mussen interviewed a New Zealander who ran in the same circles as Censori, who said: “I liked the content she posted and she and her friend group had quite a sexy, fun fashion sense.”

But as journalist Naomi Fry wrote a New Yorker article published in August 2024 that read: “[Once] her relationship with her employer turned romantic, Censori began to attract attention less for her professional achievements and more for her outrageous getups, which have tended to involve aggressive displays of nudity.” Fry added: “She herself, in other words, has become her own design project, and, perhaps, her husband’s.”

Much of this could be chalked up not to West, but rather, the person behind many of Censori’s most risqué looks, Mowalola Ogunlesi, the Nigerian-born, London-based designer who has created a number of looks for Ye’s wife, along with A-listers including Naomi Campbell, Rihanna, Solange Knowles and Megan Thee Stallion, to name a few.

“[Bianca] has a lot of say in what she wants to wear,” Ogunlesi told The Post. The LVMH prize-winning designer, who has made looks for Kardashian and daughter North West, 11, who she shares with ex-husband West, insisted that Censori and the rapper are working in tandem. “Everything Bianca is wearing is really from her and Ye’s brain.”

Meanwhile, Mussen won’t be convinced until they hear it from Censori herself. “It is unclear whether Censori is a pawn in Ye’s quest to have the “best undressed” [wife] in the world (a term he has used) or a willing accomplice in his new hyper-sexualized era,” Mussen wrote. “She has said little about their relationship publicly, preferring to remain the silent muse. Perhaps one day, NDA willing, she will tell her side of the story.”