Jeff Bezos Makes Major Financial Change After His Ex-Wife Overtook Him in 1 Money-Related Aspect
Jeff Bezos and his wife, Lauren Sánchez, are taking their position as donors of the Met Gala seriously. That’s right, the couple, who are said to be heavily involved with the preparations for this year’s gala, are also supporting fashion in a different way.
According to the WSJ, the Bezos Earth Fund just awarded $34 million in grants to institutions studying and developing materials that could replace polyester and cotton, which are the world’s most popular textiles, and also the ones that rely the most on natural resources.
Related: How do Jeff Bezos’s kids feel about Lauren Sanchez?
“Fashion has always inspired me. The craft, the creativity, the way it connects to culture. So when I started asking questions about how clothes are actually made, I couldn’t stop. The science happening right now is incredible. These teams are growing fiber from bacteria, engineering cotton that comes out of the ground in color and creating silk like fibers from compost. That’s not just good for the planet. That’s the future of fashion,” stated Lauren Sánchez Bezos, who is the Vice Chair of the Bezos Earth Fund.
Among the recipients of the grant are Columbia University, the University of California, Berkeley, Clemson University, and the Cotton Foundation.
The new donation comes amid reports that Bezos’ ex-wife, Mackenzie Scott, donated $7.2 billion of her money in 2025. This brings her total donations to $26 billion in the last five years, since she divorced Bezos and became one of the richest women alive. That number is not just more than Bezos gave to charity in 2025; it’s more than Bezos has given to charity across his entire life.
Bezos is currently the world’s fourth-richest man. He still owns 9% of Amazon, the company he founded in 1994 and has a reported net worth of $230.2 billion. He remains the company’s largest individual shareholder, even though he is no longer their CEO. He also owns the aerospace company Blue Origin and The Washington Post. Scott, meanwhile, is worth around $39 billion, a pretty big number considering what she’s donated to charity in the last few years.
Despite this new donation, Forbes estimates that Bezos and his wife, Lauren Sánchez, have given around $4.7 billion to charity over their lifetimes. That’s still significantly lower than what Mackenzie has donated in just the past few years.
Sánchez recently spoke about her involvement with the Met Gala while on the Today Show. “It has been such a fun and meaningful experience,” she said, adding, “When Anna [Wintour] called me and said “do you want to co-chair?” and also be the sponsors of the Met I was so honored. And then she told me the theme, Fashion is Art.” Sánchez explained the theme was also very intriguing for her.
“I think Lauren is going to be a wonderful asset to the museum and to the event,” Anna Wintour told CNN. “[I’m] very grateful for her incredible generosity, and she’s a great lover of costume and obviously of fashion, so we’re thrilled she’s part of the night.”
