Chantelle`s Diary

Hi guys today in this blog post I will be talking about the history of Alexander McQueen. McQueen is a huge designer within the fashion world and he still is today as we speak. I believe McQueen is very creative and imaginative when it comes to the clothes he created, his shows, and all the ideas he brought to life. Even though his time in the fashion was not that ling he managed to blow everyone away. So, here is a brief history on Alexander McQueen I hope you all like it!

Alexander McQueen was born in 1969 in the East End of London and he had 6 siblings and he was the youngest one. He decided to leave school at 16 and do an apprenticeship with tailors and when it came to doing these tailoring jobs he would move around a lot when it came to who he was working with. He went to Milan and after going to Milan he went back to London in 1990 and got a job teaching pattern cutting at Central Saint Martins College of Art & Design. In 1992 he got his master of art degrees from the college and right after he left college he feared criminal prosecution when he claimed unemployed social security benefits and he could not be caught working for money. He started to design under Alexander McQueen but claiming benefits as Lee McQueen.

Alexander McQueen began his label and his first showing of this collection was in autumn-winter of 1993. His first early collections one being the name Nihilism (spring/summer 1994) and Highland Rape being another one (autumn-winter 1995). These collections were being relied on with shock tactics instead of wearability and that is how his identity was becoming strong. These designs were showing variations of abuse and victimization as the theme. When it came to his runway shows it was very extraordinary and not only was designing a big part for McQueen but the styling & presentations being dramatic was important as well. He had models that would walk on water, and also surrounded by ring flames.

McQueen in 1996 was playing to this reputation he had and it was these accusations of him being misogynistic in one of his collections which was the “Highland Rape Collection”. His models in the collection were featured looking bruised and having models stagger on an apocalyptic runway (autumn-winter 1996). McQueen was not just good at tailoring but having commercial sense was sharp as well. The show he did which was the “Dante Show” had an order from Bergdorf Goodman. Once Goodman was his backer he sort of toned down but not as much with the content of his shows. Later in 1996 he did hire a new backer which was the Japanese corporate giant Onward Kashiyama and it is a big clothing production business and one of the world’s biggest. This clothing house also backs Helmut Lang and Paul Smith. In 1996 McQueen was named as British Designer of the year which he repeated in 1997 and 2001. McQueen did chill out a bit with his style but once being with Givenchy he did bring these themes he had to life in his collections. His themes were more of a dark romantic with some vision of history and politics. Once the 1990s came his models had this female glamour to them but in a form of terror. What McQueen has said about this is that he wants females to look powerful so people would not even think about laying a hand on her.

In December of 2000 McQueen sold a share of his business to Gucci and then in 2001 he did decide to leave Givenchy. In March of 2001 McQueen opened his custom-made menswear line with Savile Row tailors Huntsman. He even came out with his own perfume in 2003. Sadly, in 2010 McQueen did pass away but as we know McQueen was huge designer within the fashion world and he always will be. He had a different vision that he showed the world and as we know even today McQueen is still such a huge fashion brand.