There were some people who blamed the fashion industry itself for McQueen’s death. Journalist George Pitcher, writing in the Daily Telegraph, believed that fashion was nothing but a ‘chimera of a real industry, the absence of which would harm no one other than its self-serving catamites and courtesans. It is a disgusting place to make a living.’18 Designer Ben de Lisi said that fashion ‘is a horrible industry, rife with angst’,19 while John Maybury stated, ‘I wouldn’t wish success in fashion on my worst enemy – the demands it puts on people, the attention, the spotlight, is all so intense.’20
On 12 February, the day of Joyce McQueen’s funeral, Naomi Campbell and Daphne Guinness appeared as models at a benefit fashion show to raise funds for Haiti after the recent earthquake. Before the show started, the Duchess of York, Sarah Ferguson, paid tribute to the designer. ‘To Alexander McQueen, thank you,’ she said.21 That morning, one of the fifteen catsuits Daphne had ordered from McQueen arrived and so she decided to wear that instead of the ‘pink confection’ the organizers had planned for her. ‘I thought what would Alexander do and so I put some tulle around my head,’ she said. ‘I was already crying quite a lot, but I thought if I walked fast enough it would billow out. And it worked – you couldn’t see the wet mascara.’22
On 25 February, McQueen’s funeral was held at St Paul’s Church, Knightsbridge. Janet, her son, Gary, and Shaun Leane went to see Lee to pay their last respects. Gary placed a photograph of himself and his brother Paul when they were younger into the coffin, together with some rose petals. ‘I went in by myself and it was quite upsetting,’ he said. ‘I thought I could handle it, but I couldn’t.’23 Tributes were read by Jacqui and her son Elliot, and Holly Chapman, McQueen’s niece. Janet chose Elgar’s ‘Nimrod’, ‘a piece that Lee and myself enjoyed listening to – Lee always had Classic FM on,’ she said.24 The service also included ‘Jerusalem’, a hymn that had been sung at Joyce’s funeral two weeks earlier, and the final song was Diana Ross singing ‘Remember Me’.
On 28 April, an inquest held at Westminster Coroner’s Court concluded, in the words of the coroner Dr Paul Knapman, that McQueen had ‘killed himself while the balance of his mind was disturbed’. The court reported the cause of death – asphyxia and hanging – and heard testimonies from the housekeeper Cesar Garcia and Dr Stephen Pereira. ‘He certainly felt very pressured by his work, but it was a double-edged sword,’ said the psychiatrist. ‘He felt it was the only area of his life where he felt he had achieved something . . . He was a very secretive person. Over a period of time he had been let down by various friends who he felt were taking advantage of who he was. For that reason he was very guarded. He had been terribly let down in long-standing close relationships. He was very close to his mother. I think on top of the grief he felt there was that one link that had gone from his life and there was very little to live for.’25 The words presented a version of the truth, but by no means the whole picture.
Gucci had employed Jonathan Coad, who was then head of litigation at the specialist law firm Swan Turton and an expert in ‘reputation management’, to help to restrain the reporting of McQueen’s death. ‘Gucci were really good at putting everything in place to stop the press speaking to us,’ said McQueen’s sister Janet. ‘We never really had a voice. Jonathan Coad said that there might be things at the inquest that would come out, and tried to warn us how bad it would be. But I wanted to be there for my brother.’26 From the court, Janet took the belt with which Lee had hanged himself, while Jacqui kept the rail, the last objects touched by their brother.
The police and the coroner maintained that Lee had died by his own hand, but McQueen’s family had their suspicions. ‘Do we know that Lee committed suicide?’ asked Ron and both Janet and Jacqui have questioned the circumstances of their brother’s suicide.27 Considering the evidence – and McQueen’s long-standing death wish – it seems highly unlikely that McQueen’s death was anything but suicide. But the family feel that certain people could have done more to support Lee in his psychological troubles, and they have their suspicions about why more was not done.
McQueen died a rich man. Probate papers showed that his art collection had been valued at an estimated £1 million. His flat in Dunraven Street was worth £2.5 million, while other land and buildings he owned totalled £2,635,000. He owned £11,614,625 worth of shares. He had £193,290 in one bank account, £638,017 in another; £26,282 in a Euro account; £1,570,005 in a fixed account; £27,688 in an Isa, and £30,000 in Premium Bonds. In his will, Lee left £100,000 each to four charities: the Terrence Higgins Trust, Battersea Dogs & Cats Home, the London Buddhist Centre and the Blue Cross. Lee gave the trustees £50,000 so they could administer the upkeep and maintenance of his three dogs; Marlene Garcia took Minter, Juice went to Annabelle Neilson, and Jacqui looked after Callum. He bequeathed £50,000 each to Marlene and Cesar Garcia, and the same sum to each of his nephews and nieces and his godson Thomas Alexander McQueen. He left £250,000 to each of his brothers and sisters, but the bulk of his net estate, which amounted to £16,036,500, went into a trust for his charity, Sarabande.
Since her brother’s death Janet McQueen has had a long-running dispute with the trustees of the charity, particularly David Glick, a high-profile entertainment lawyer, and Gary Jackson, an accountant, men McQueen had appointed as executors of his will. ‘The executors may have behaved within the law but in our view they haven’t behaved with compassion,’ Janet told the Mail on Sunday.28 The family was upset that they did not have the opportunity to see Lee’s Green Street flat or choose any mementoes to remember him by. Janet also wanted to know details of Sarabande’s grants and bursaries, but she was told that the information was confidential. ‘I just wanted to know that his money was being spent wisely,’ she said.29 Throughout the process the family maintained that they felt left out and overlooked. A typical communication was the solicitor’s letter that Ron received on 2 November 2011 that gave him the details of the Big Yellow Self Storage unit, which contained the ‘personal effects of your late son which do not have monetary value’.30 Jacqui and Janet paid a visit to the storage unit on Wick Lane, Bow, an experience both of them found distressing; some of his clothes had been kept so long that they had been eaten by moths. Jacqui remembers holding a jumper that had once belonged to Lee and pressing it to her face; the sweater still smelt of her brother.31
On a misty day towards the end of May 2010, three months after McQueen’s death, his close family gathered in Kilmuir Cemetery on the northern tip of the Isle of Skye to bury the cremated remains of their brother. He had given instructions that he should be buried on Skye, a place which both he and his mother connected with their family ancestry.
It was a small, private gathering attended by Lee’s three sisters, Janet, Tracy and Jacqui, and his brother, Tony. His other brother Michael was still recovering from his heart attack and his father, Ron, was too ill to travel (he was suffering from cancer and died in October 2012). Standing next to the grave, Lee’s sisters and brother contemplated their sibling’s extraordinary life and his untimely death. As a Scottish piper played, Tony, who had been charged with the task, knelt down and placed a black enamelled urn containing Lee’s ashes into the ground. The vicar said a prayer and then each family member dropped a handful of earth into the grave.
Since Lee’s funeral his brothers and sisters have made repeated pilgrimages to the cemetery; in October 2011, after Callum’s death, Jacqui took the dog’s ashes to Skye and had them buried next to her brother.
McQueen’s grave stands on a windswept headland, looking out towards the sea. Inscribed on the green slate headstone are the words that he had had tattooed onto his right arm, words that meant so much to him: ‘Love looks not with the eyes but with the mind.’ It was the one thing in the world, McQueen often said, that he knew to be true.
Acknowledgements
This book could not have been written without the support and blessing of the McQueen family. Janet, Tony, Michael and Jacqui McQueen took the hard
decision to allow a stranger into their lives. I must thank them for their patience and understanding during what must have been a difficult and emotional process. I would like to single out McQueen’s first and greatest muse, his sister Janet, for special thanks. She took the brave step to disclose a family secret that affected both her and Lee. I interviewed her on multiple occasions and she answered dozens of queries by telephone and email. I cannot thank her enough. I would also like to thank Janet’s sons Gary James McQueen and Paul McQueen for sharing their memories of their much-loved uncle.
I must also thank the McQueen family for permission to reproduce excerpts from Joyce McQueen’s unpublished history of the family and for the opportunity to use a range of unpublished photographs.
McQueen was not much of a letter writer and so this book was written not with the use of archival material but through interviews with the people who knew him. I must thank McQueen’s boyfriends who helped me with the research: Murray Arthur, Richard Brett, Andrew Groves, Jay Massacret, Archie Reed, Paul Stag, and Glenn Andrew Teeuw.
I interviewed a wide range of people during the course of researching and writing the book and I would like to thank: Miguel Adrover, Linda Björg Árnadóttir, Carmen Artigas, Russell Atkins, Ferhan Azman, Brooke Baker, John Banks, Rebecca Barton, Nicola Bateman, Fleet Bigwood, BillyBoy*, Detmar Blow, Chris Bird, John Boddy, Rosemarie Bolger, Peter Bowes, Dr Stephen Brogan, Fiona Cartledge, Adele Clough, Ben Copperwheat, Lee Copperwheat, Simon Costin, Liz Farrelly, Frank Franka, Lesley Goring, Richard Gray, Daphne Guinness, A.M. Hanson, Guy Morgan-Harris, Anna Harvey, Jane Hayward, Bobby Hillson, John Hitchcock, Marin Hopper, Mira Chai Hyde, Dafydd Jones, Ben de Lisi, John McKitterick, John Maybury, Jason Meakin, Suzy Menkes, Trevor Merrell, Réva Mivasagar, Max Newsom, Seta Niland, Mr Pearl, Sebastian Pons, Janet Street-Porter, Dai Rees, Eric Rose, Norman Schoerner, Alice Smith, Sue Stemp, Lise Strathdee, Plum Sykes, Koji Tatsuno, Stephen Todd, Derrick Tomlinson, Nicholas Townsend (Trixie), Simon Ungless, Donald Urquhart, Michelle Wade, Tania Wade, the late Professor Louise Wilson, and Kerry Youmans. Some interviewees wanted to remain anonymous, while one person I spoke to chose to use a pseudonym.
A large number of people provided leads and background information and I would like to thank: Yeana Ahn, Frans Ankoné, Oliver Azis, Kara Baker, Richard Benson, Andrew Bolton, Gavin Brown, Paula Byrne, Peter Close at Central St Martins (CSM), Nicholas Coleridge, Vanessa Cotton, Laura Craik, Alison D’Amario, Anne Deniau, Primrose Dixon, Paula Fitzherbert, Zoe Franklin, Natalie Gibson, Colin Glen, Hettie Harvey, Gavanndra Hodge, Liz Hoggard, Tina Jordan, James Kent, Jasmine Kharbanda, Pascale Lamche, Saskia Lamche, Stephanie Lilley, Gaby and Gary Lincoln, William Ling, Susan Lord, Debbie Lotmore at CSM, William Matthews at Gieves Hawkes, Colin McDowell, Shonagh Marshall, Marko Matysik, Princess Michael of Kent, Annabelle Neilson, Michelle Olley, Elinor Renfrew, Caroline Roux, Richard Royle, Angel Sedgwick, Alix Sharkey, Christopher Stocks, Joanna Sykes, Andrew Tanser, Sue Tilley, Katie Webb, Claire Wilcox at the V&A, Judy Willcocks at CSM.
A number of libraries proved invaluable during the course of the research. I would like to thank the staff of the libraries of Central St Martins, the London College of Fashion and the British Library. The British Library’s Oral History of Photography project, held in the Sound Archive, provided some useful background information on colleagues who worked with McQueen, especially an in-depth interview with Nick Knight.
For use of the photographs in the book I would like to thank, in addition to the McQueen family: Miguel Adrover, Murray Arthur, Rebecca Barton, BBC Photo Library, Rosemarie Bolger, Peter Bowes, Richard Brett, Camera Press, Claridge’s, Jeremy Deller, Getty Images, A.M. Hanson, Mira Chai Hyde, Dafydd Jones, Jay Massacret, Archie Reed, Rex Features, and Derrick Tomlinson.
I have consulted a number of broadcast sources including: British Style Genius, BBC, October 2008; ‘Cutting Up Rough’ (The Works), BBC, 1997; McQueen and I, More4, 25 February 2011; The Clothes Show, BBC1, 26 January 1997.
I have also referred to a wide range of newspaper and magazine reports, all of which are referenced in the notes. However, I would like to single out the following journalists and writers for their work: Hilary Alexander, Lisa Armstrong, Lynn Barber, Katherine Betts, Tamsin Blanchard, Alex Bilmes, Hamish Bowles, Grace Bradberry, Jess Cartner-Morley, Vassi Chamberlain, Laura Collins, Maggie Davis, Godfrey Deeny, Christa D’Souza, Edward Enninful, Bridget Foley, Susannah Frankel, Chris Heath, Cathy Horyn, Marion Hume, David Kamp, Rebecca Lowthorpe, Colin McDowell, Lisa Markwell, Rebecca Mead, Suzy Menkes, Sarah Mower, Samantha Murray Greenway, Andrew O’Hagan, Harriet Quick, Melanie Rickey, Alix Sharkey, James Sherwood, Ingrid Sischy, David James Smith, Mimi Spencer, Stephen Todd, Judith Thurman, Lorna V, Iain R. Webb, and Eric Wilson.
Thanks are also due to Andrew Bolton, curator of the Met’s wonderful 2011 show and editor of Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (Yale University Press) and Judith Watt, whose book Alexander McQueen: The Life and the Legacy (Harper Design, London and New York) provided a useful overview of the designer’s career.
At Simon & Schuster I would like to thank my editor Abigail Bergstrom, Mike Jones (who commissioned the book but has moved on to pastures new), copy editor Lindsay Davies, Sarah Birdsey, Olivia Morris, Hannah Corbett, Elinor Fewster, Roz Lippel my editor in the US, and all the staff in London and New York for their support and enthusiasm.
Clare Alexander, my agent and friend, has been with me from day one. This book would not have been written without her. I would also like to thank all the staff of Aitken Alexander, particularly Lesley Thorne and Sally Riley.
Lastly, I must thank – as always – my parents, my friends and Marcus Field.
Alexander McQueen Womenswear Collections 1992–2010
To see all of McQueen’s shows, apart from Jack the Ripper, Taxi Driver and Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, go to: http://www.gainsburyandwhiting.com/fashionshow/
St Martins MA Graduate collection, Jack the Ripper Stalks His Victims, 1992
Taxi Driver, Autumn/Winter 1993
Nihilism, Spring/Summer 1994
Bheansidhe (Banshee), Autumn/Winter 1994
The Birds, Spring/Summer 1995
Highland Rape, Autumn/Winter 1995
The Hunger, Spring/Summer 1996
Dante, Autumn/Winter 1996
Bellmer La Poupée, Spring/Summer 1997
It’s a Jungle Out There, Autumn/Winter 1997
Untitled, Spring/Summer 1998
Joan, Autumn/Winter 1998
No. 13, Spring/Summer 1999
The Overlook, Autumn/Winter 1999
Eye, Spring/Summer 2000
Eshu, Autumn/Winter 2000
Voss, Spring/Summer 2001
What a Merry-Go-Round, Autumn/Winter 2001
The Dance of the Twisted Bull, Spring/Summer 2002
Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, Autumn/Winter 2002
Irere, Spring/Summer 2003
Scanners, Autumn/Winter 2003
Deliverance, Spring/Summer 2004
Pantheon as Lecum, Autumn/Winter 2004
It’s Only a Game, Spring/Summer 2005
The Man Who Knew Too Much, Autumn/Winter 2005
Neptune, Spring/Summer 2006
The Widows of Culloden, Autumn/Winter 2006
Sarabande, Spring/Summer 2007
In Memory of Elizabeth Howe, Salem, 1692, Autumn/Winter 2007
La Dame Bleue, Spring/Summer 2008
The Girl Who Lived in the Tree, Autumn/Winter 2008
Natural Dis-Tinction, Un-Natural Selection, Spring/Summer 2009
The Horn of Plenty, Autumn/Winter 2009
Plato’s Atlantis, Spring/Summer 2010
Notes
Introduction
1 ‘Remembering a Renegade Designer’, Cathy Horyn, New York Times, 20 September 2010
2 ‘Crazy for a Piece of the Fashion Action’, Lisa Markwell, Independent, 22 September 2010
3 Alexander McQueen obituary, Imogen Fox, Gu
ardian, 11 February 2010
4 ‘An Enigma Remembered’, Economist, 12 November 2012
5 ‘The Real McQueen’, Susannah Frankel, American Harper’s Bazaar, April 2007
6 Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (Yale University Press, New Haven, 2011), p. 26
7 ‘Memories of McQueen, A Brave Heart’, Hilary Alexander, Daily Telegraph, 21 September 2010
8 The Great Fashion Designers, Brenda Polan, Roger Tredre (Berg, Oxford, New York, 2009), p. 244
9 Interview with Jacqui McQueen, 8 April 2014
10 Reverend Canon Giles Fraser, A Service of Thanksgiving to Celebrate the Life of Lee Alexander McQueen CBE, Monday 20 September 2010, p. 5
11 Interview with Andrew Groves, 24 April 2013
12 Interview with Alice Smith, 7 May 2013
13 Interview with Andrew Groves, 24 April 2013
14 ‘The Real McQueen’, Susannah Frankel, op. cit.
15 Savage Beauty, Metropolitan Museum, p. 12
16 ‘Fashion World Gathers to Celebrate Alexander McQueen’, Alistair Foster and Miranda Bryant, Evening Standard, 20 September 2010
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