Where the fashion cosmos is dominated by names with the longevity of comets — from Coco Chanel and Christian Dior to Karl Lagerfeld and Vivienne Westwood — Alexander McQueen was more of a shooting star, his career cut short by his suicide in 2010, aged 40.
At that point, he had created 36 collections for his own label across 18 years — not including his work at Givenchy, where he was appointed head designer in 1996 (a mere four years after he graduated from the fashion program at London's Central Saint Martins College).
The Givenchy years cemented him as an international rockstar of fashion — feted by Vogue, worn by celebrities including Madonna and David Bowie, and headhunted by Gucci creative director Tom Ford, with the company buying a majority stake in McQueen's label in 2000.
