Alexander McQueen

Lee Alexander McQueen (17 March 1969 – 11 February 2010) was a British fashion designer and couturier.

Lee Alexander McQueen was born on 17 March 1969 at University Hospital Lewisham in Lewisham, London, to Ronald and Joyce McQueen, the youngest of six children.

His Scottish father worked as a taxi driver, and his mother a social science teacher.

It was reported that he grew up in a council flat, but, in fact, the McQueens moved to a terraced house in Stratford in his first year.

McQueen attended Carpenters Road Primary School, before going to Rokeby School.

He was interested in clothes from a young age.

As the youngest of six children, McQueen began experimenting with fashion by making dresses for his three sisters.

His earliest fashion memory reaches back to when he was just three years old, drawing a dress on the wall of his East London family home.

He was also fascinated by birds and was a member of the Young Ornithologists' Club; later, in his professional career, he often used birds as motifs in his designs.

McQueen left school aged 16 in 1985 with only one O-level in art and took a course in tailoring at Newham College.

He went on to serve a two-year apprenticeship in coat-making with Savile Row tailors Anderson & Sheppard before joining Gieves & Hawkes as a pattern cutter for a short time.

The skills he learned as an apprentice on Savile Row helped earn him a reputation in the fashion world as an expert in creating an impeccably tailored look.

McQueen later claimed that he had sewed obscenities into the lining of suits made for Prince Charles, although a recall of suits made by Anderson & Sheppard to check found no evidence of this.

After Savile Row, he worked briefly for the theatrical costumiers Angels and Bermans, making costumes for shows such as Les Misérables.

In 1989, at the age of 20, he was hired by experimental Mayfair-based designer Koji Tatsuno.

He first worked as a pattern cutter before moving into clothing production.

Shortly after, he moved to fashion label Red or Dead, working under designer John McKitterick; here he gained experience with fetishwear.

When McKitterick left Red or Dead in early 1990 to launch his own label, he hired McQueen.

By this time, McQueen was interested in becoming a designer himself, and McKitterick recommended he try for an apprenticeship in Italy, then the centre of the fashion world.

In spring 1990, McQueen left for Milan, Italy.

He had no standing job offer, but secured a position with Romeo Gigli on the basis of his portfolio and tailoring experience.

He resigned from Gigli's studio in July 1990, and had returned to London – and McKitterick's label – by August that year.

McQueen was still hungry to learn more about designing clothes, so McKitterick suggested he see Bobby Hillson, the Head of the Masters course in fashion at London art school Central Saint Martins (CSM).

McQueen turned up at CSM with a pile of sample clothing and no appointment, seeking a job teaching pattern cutting.

He founded his own Alexander McQueen label in 1992, and was chief designer at Givenchy from 1996 to 2001.

His achievements in fashion earned him four British Designer of the Year awards (1996, 1997, 2001 and 2003), as well as the Council of Fashion Designers of America International Designer of the Year award in 2003.

McQueen's catwalk shows were noted for their drama and theatricality, and they often ended with elements of performance art, such as a model being spray painted by robots (No. 13, Spring/Summer 1999), or a life-size illusion of Kate Moss (The Widows of Culloden, Autumn/Winter 2006).

McQueen's legacy in fashion and culture is extensive.

In 2000, McQueen sold 51% of his company to the Gucci Group, which established boutiques for his label worldwide and expanded its product range.

During his career, he designed a total of 36 collections for his brand, including his graduation collection and unfinished final collection.

Following his death, longtime collaborator Sarah Burton took over as creative director of his label.

As a designer, McQueen was known for sharp tailoring, historicism, and imaginative designs that often verged into the controversial.

He explored themes such as romanticism, sexuality, and death, and many collections had autobiographical elements.

Among his best-known individual designs are the bumsters, the skull scarf, and the armadillo shoes.

McQueen died by suicide in 2010 at the age of 40, at his home in Mayfair, London, shortly after the death of his mother.

McQueen had a background in tailoring before he studied fashion and embarked on a career as a designer.

His MA graduation collection caught the attention of fashion editor Isabella Blow, who became his patron.

McQueen's early designs, particularly the radically low-cut "bumster" trousers, gained him recognition as an enfant terrible in British fashion.

His designs were showcased in two retrospective exhibitions: Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty (2011 and 2015) and Lee Alexander McQueen: Mind, Mythos, Muse (2022).

He remains the subject of journalistic and academic analysis, including the book Gods and Kings (2015) by fashion journalist Dana Thomas and the documentary film McQueen (2018).