The exhibition consisted of 6 rooms. Each colour palette making you feel a different emotion, a different level of uncomfortable.
Goosebumps enhanced by a powerful air conditioning, every room was haunting in its own way. There were masks, there were scales, skin, even curls from Lee McQueen's own hair pinned onto dresses in the form of a trademark. Aspects from the mind of McQueen were pulled from every collection in between the years of Highland Rape and Plato's Atlantis.
I'm confident in saying that Lee did not make clothes for women to look pretty. A feminist, he aimed to make women look powerful, daunting almost, in his garish creations. He didn't design clothing: he sculpted political statements, controversial catwalks. He made ugly beautiful. He turned controversiality into art. What was known as 'savage', became beauty through the mind of McQueen.
The V & A could not have produced a more terrifyingly breathtaking portrayal of McQueen's work. I was lucky enough to witness it in its final hours (thank you to the V & A for releasing 24 hour tickets) yet I could never have anticipated what I saw. Alexander McQueen has always been among my favourite fashion houses; it was the campaign I'd always skip to when looking through Vogue. But actually seeing the collections up close - as well as a floating projection of Kate Moss - it moved me. And I believe it would move anyone, follower of fashion or not.
