Olivia Munn on Her Chain Mail 2018 Met Gala Dress 'We Were Inspired By the Crusades'

Actress Olivia Munn said on the red carpet of the 2018 Met Gala that her look for the annual event was inspired by the Crusades, the series of religious battles where European Christians asserted their dominance in a quest for holy sites in the Middle East.

“This look is head-to-toe chain metal. So, it’s very heavy and we were inspired by the Crusades. I love this dress,” she told Entertainment Tonight on the red carpet Monday evening.

Munn’s dress was custom made by H & M, according to ET, and replete with a headdress by Michael Schmidt. She told ET that the dress was purposely built with a corset, “because we wanted to have this feeling of armor and have everything pulled in together.”

The theme of this year’s Met Gala was Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination. But the Crusades are not the finest part of Catholic history. The battles between Muslims and Christians for holy sites in the Middle East lasted nearly 200 years, from 1096 to 1291. They were sparked by a call from the Pope at the time, Pope Urban II, who called on Christians to wrest these sites from Muslim control. These battles also resulted in massacres of Jews and destroyed some Jewish communities.

Some online observers were scratching their heads at the dress’s source of inspiration.