While Seán McGirr’s debut as creative director of Alexander McQueen was held in an underground concrete venue, in keeping with the McQueen spirit of presenting at a rebellious distance from Paris’s glitzy centre, for his second collection, the Irish-born, London-based designer went for a sharp about-turn: a fine art school on the capital’s well-heeled Left Bank.
Eerie strings played as guests filed into the grand, cavernous hall of the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts. Anna Wintour seemed in jolly spirits as she chatted chummily with Salma Hayek and her husband, François-Henri Pinault, the CEO of luxury conglomerate Kering, which owns McQueen. An eclectic front row included British fashion designer and socialite Daphne Guinness and American rapper Cardi B, who was shrouded in a fur coat. Scuzzy was out, sheen was in.
