Alexander McQueen S/S 2003 Paris

[helmut.newton]

I could not find a thread for it! Am I blind? Either way this was definitely one of his best shows. So influential, and so coveted; that skull scarf was arguably what he came to be associated with during the latter stages of his career.

PARIS, October 5, 2002

By Sarah Mower

Alexander McQueen, showman, bad boy, where are you now? After joining Gucci Group and losing 30 pounds, the designer has shed his famously macabre show tactics. The most shocking things about his summer presentation were its stripped-down, old-fashioned romance and solid commercial appeal.

Against a giant screen projection of underwater scenes and Blair Witch–style haunted woods, McQueen unfolded a sartorial narrative that began with pirates and drowned maidens and ended in the rainforest. The odd journey took in brown leather corset vests and minis, worn with creamy chiffon ruffles, drapey knicker-length shorts, and Elizabethan doublets and ruffs. After a diversion into a largely redundant black sequence, McQueen burst out with prints and colors, and some major showstoppers in the form of floaty dresses in vibrant tie-dyes and jumpsuits in lime and electric blue. His crescendo was a rainbow-colored floor-sweeping gown with tulle ruffles and some spectacular boleros made of what looked like bird-of-paradise feathers.

Full Show:

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[Alliecat]

wow - there were some lovely pieces.

 

[Squizree]

It's that dress

 

[helmut.newton]

The premise of Alexander McQueen’s spring/summer 2003 presentation was of a shipwreck at sea and a consequent landfall in the Amazon. Critics lauded McQueen for his designs because they retained the theatrical and transporting impact of the presentation but also yielded wearable and desirable fashions. The “Oyster” dress, while dramatic in its sweep and red-carpet authority, benefits even further by close examination. As Women’s Wear Daily noted, “Fabulous though this presentation was, the clothes are better up close, revealing a mind-boggling degree of creativity and work.” Attached to a beautifully fitted and boned corset, the voluminous skirt is comprised of hundreds of graduated layers of ivory organza. Like a mille-feuille pastry, each layer both conforms to and detaches itself from every other layer of silk. With a post-modernist’s irony and deconstructivist’s preference for worn effects, the silk is left with an unfinished, raw, cut edge. Elsewhere on the gown, silk chiffon is conscientiously pieced and applied to create a slightly matte surface to the bodice and left unfinished as it extends at the shoulders to curdle along its edges like kelp or skin after an exfoliating burn.

This dress was phenomenal!! The detailing and the way he worked the silk to look a little like sea shells/oysters is amazing.

“Oyster Dress,” spring/summer 2003. Ivory silk chiffon and silk organza.

source: blog.metmuseum.org/

 

[thejarc]

I was wondered why there was no thread for this monumental collection.

My personal McQueen-fave

 

[Petit Lucille]

i am trying to gather all his collections in hq, i have none of this one, if anybody knows where can i find, or has them, please, post, pm, something!!!

 

[Squizree]

Have you tried Firstview.com? You gotta pay for them and even then I don't think they're HQ.

Alternatively you can contact ShootDigital through their website. That's the company that shot the photos for Style.com, they will have HQs for sure.