Thursday 11 February 2010

Goodbye to THE STAR OF THE SHOW ALEXANDER MCQUEEN, "sometimes unwearable, always memorable.



In my opinion there is no longer any point in watching the fashion shows. They can all be done digitally and it would save magazines and everybody involved a lot of money. Of course there are industries that will be ruined too, Paris would change, hotels would be empty in Milan, New York and Paris as they would no longer have so many people descending on them for these occasions. Alexander McQueen dying at just 40, could seriously prove the end of fashion as we know it. Quite honestly, nobody is as interesting or unique as this man - his concepts, team of hairdressers, ideas, clothes, shoes. He made the whole fashion business tolerable. You guessed it, I was a fan. Of course there are others - John Galliano, Alaia, Giambattista Valle, Lagerfeld and Jean Paul Gaultier - but without the flamboyance from the son of a London taxi driver, nothing can truly be the same or as interesting again. He was amusing, witty, ahead of the game, sometimes unwearable but always memorable. It was claimed that he found fame through Isabella Blow, whilst he was at St Martins. She told everybody about him. Wearing his couture clothes made her in turn famous. At one stage they were visual partners: he produced them, she wore them. Their relationship was always up and down, as it of course would be, because they had huge characters. Once Issy gave me a dress to wear, she took it from me and with its labels still intact, told my son to trash it through the garden to give it more character. This he did happily. Loved and worn by many, including Daphne Guinness, myself, Annabel Nielson, Kim Hersov,Pam Hogg, Lucy Ferry and Rushka Bergman, I have so many of his black jackets, probably fifty at the very least, I live in them, they gave me my love of tails. This is a true tragedy. He was well loved and very well respected. I shall mourn him and be sorry I can't go to any shows in Paris this season .. but the others are not worth it. Anyway, Tim Blanks does them so well on style.com. Whatever Lee's reasons for taking his life, my heart goes out to his team, to Guido's expert team of hair stylists, Snowden Hill among them, make up artists, to Phillip Treacy who made his hats, the models, Connie in his shop who dresses me, and to him. You were all the most exciting thing in fashion week.

5 comments:

Scott Fazzini said...

It's overwhelmingly sad, and I've never had the good fortune to have met him. A truly original and outstanding talent; he will be greatly missed.

Unknown said...

I remember, on a trip to London in 2003/4, going into Alexander McQueen on Bond Street looking for a bottle of Kingdom.

According to Vogue, the shop was to have been opened a few weeks previously but when I got there, there seemed to be a lot of confusion. I was handed some bottled water and left to amuse myself while the salespeople went in search of the perfume.

In the window was the most beautiful dress I have seen before or since, the Oyster dress. It was so beautiful that the memory of it invokes an awed hush in me, even now.

As I paid for my perfume, they told me that it was the first day the shop had opened - apparently there had been delays.

I thought of that day with every puff of the perfume - I had bought the big bottle and it lasted for ages (when I smelled Daphne Guinness's perfume last fall, I knew I had finally found its successor).

I was truly shocked today to see the news of his death. I feel terrible for everyone involved, of course, but particularly his family, who are burying his mother tomorrow and him forth with. To lose a mother and the youngest sibling inside a couple of weeks is just, well - to those who claim that hell doesn't exist, this is proof.

premierludwig said...

Thanks Amanda for expressing it all so perfectly. It has long been one of my dreams to attend a McQueen fashion show because his work was truly fashion art in every sense, the way I prefer fashion (and often art as I wear so many things emblazoned with prints from famous pieces) to be.

Watching the news tonight I really felt for him and had tears in my eyes though never knowing him.

Such a loss. I feel the world will sadly be a much duller place without him.

Liza Campbell said...

a big fat zero about him. The fashion world, dontcha love it

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