Lee Alexander McQueen Tribute

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The fashion pack take time out from London Fashion Week for designer Alexander McQueen's memorial service at St. Paul's Cathedral.

BY Hilary Alexander | 20 September 2010

Lee McQueen would have loved it. His memorial service at St Paul's Cathedral today (Monday) had all the theatrical drama, raw human emotion, heritage, ecclesiastical splendour, and beauty that characterized his catwalk shows.

From the arrival of the 1,500 guests, some wearing tartan, feathers, "barnacle shoes", chrome-yellow-dyed hair, Edward Scissorhands-tailoring, studded pillboxes, and sequined T-shirts, to Donald Lindsay, the lone piper, in a McQueen tartan kilt, playing the Braveheart pipe motif, who led the choir, the College of Minor Canons, the Visiting Clergy, the College of Canons, the Chapter and the congregation to the West End of St Paul's, everything resounded with the sense of the marvelous and the macabre which McQueen adored.

The Reverend Canon Giles Fraser conducted the service, appropriately wearing one of the new gold and white copes, encrusted with Svarovski crystals, which were commissioned for the cathedral's 300th anniversary, and designed by Marie Brisou, from Central St Martins fashion college - from where McQueen graduated in 1995 with a MA in Fashion Design.

McQueen, he said, 'despite the dazzle of his world, never forgot his East End roots and how much he owed to his loved ones.'

Kate Moss, in a McQueen leather dress; Naomi Campbell, in McQueen black fur and feathers; and Sarah Jessica Parker, in a black tailored McQueen coat, and white tulle dress, were among the 1,500 family, friends, and fashionistas who attended the service.

McQueen's nephew, Mark McQueen, read the first reading, from John 14: 1-6; and another nephew, Gary Hulyer, said one of the Prayers of Intercession.

The addresses were given by Anna Wintour, the editor-in-chief of American Vogue; Shaun Leane, the jewellery designer who created all the silver "armour" for McQueen's collections; Suzy Menkes, the fashion editor of the International Herald Tribune; and Annabelle Nielson, one of Lee's closest friends.

Ms Wintour recalled how, when McQueen first made his mark at London Fashion Week, the volatile designer had missed a major photographic shoot, declaring "I couldn't give a flying f... about Vogue"; it was subsequently discovered he had been on the dole at the time and was worried a fashion-aware jobsworth at Social Security might spot the published photograph and take away his benefits. She said his catwalk events had simultaneously "shocked, thrilled and repulsed."

Leane said he would never forget McQueen's 'dirty laugh, brave heart, memory like an elephant and bright blue eyes.'

Ms Menkes remembered McQueen's last words to her ,"bones are beautiful", describing his skeleton-inspired menswear collection shown in January, in Paris, the penultimate collection before he took his own life, on February 11th, 2010, distraught over the death of his beloved mother whose funeral was to take place the next day.

McQueen had, she said, "an unparalleled vision of the future dragged down by the demons of his past."

"Londoners took him to their hearts as the greatest designer this country has ever produced", said Nielson.

The Memorial Service featured a performance by the Icelandic singer Bjork - wearing McQueen "angel wings" and an ostrich feather dress - of "Gloomy Sunday", the song recorded by Billie Holliday, in 1941, and once known as "the Hungarian suicide song", as the lyrics refer to someone planning to join a loved one beyond the grave.

Other performances included a piano solo by the film composer, Michael Nyman, who played "The heart asks pleasure first", the "theme" tune from his best-selling soundtrack for the award-winning movie "The Piano".

Other notable figures at the Memorial Service included Francois-Henri Pinault, the CEO of PPR, the French conglomerate which owns the McQueen label under its Gucci Group umbrella; the designers, Hussein Chalayan, Stella McCartney, Antonio Berardi, and Pam Hogg; Daphne Guinness; Julia Delves-Broughton, the sister of the late, Isabella Blow, the English fashion icon who "discovered" Alexander McQueen at his graduate show; Carine Roitfeld, the editor-in-chief of French Vogue; the models Stella Tennant and Karen Elson; Bobbie Gillespie, the lead singer of Primal Scream; the singer, Sharleen Spiteri; the milliner Philip Treacy; the stylist Judy Blame; Cathy Horyn, the fashion editor of The New York Times; and the Dazed & Confused publisher, Jefferson Hack.

Fashionistas paid tribute to the late Alexander McQueen at a private memorial service at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London on Monday.

Among those present were Sarah Jessica Parker, Naomi Campbell, Stella McCartney, and Kate Moss to remember McQueen, who committed suicide in February at the age of 40.

Vogue editor Anna Wintour led the service, Us Magazine reports, and a St. Paul’s Cathedral spokesperson told the magazine, “It was a beautiful service of Thanksgiving to celebrate the life of Lee Alexander McQueen."

Wintour calls McQueen “a complex and gifted young man.”

She added, “As a child he loved nothing more than sitting on the roof top and watching the birds fly by," she continued, “His final collection was a battle between dark and light. His was an 18-year career of harnessing his dreams and demons.”

“He showed us everything was possible, dreams could become reality," she went on. "But he left us with an even more exceptional legacy, a talent that soared like the birds of his childhood above us all."

Setembro 20th, 2010 | by Rodolfo | No Comments »

Kate Moss, Sarah Jessica Parker and Naomi Campbell

Stella McCartney, Daphne Guinness and US Vogue editor Anna Wintour

Pam Hogg, Jefferson Hack, and Primal Scream frontman Bobby Gillespie

St Paul’s Cathedral in London this morning.