Charlie Rose once asked Alexander McQueen to describe the woman he designed for. “I really care about a woman’s independence,” McQueen said. “I don’t like her to look so naive and so fragile. I like her to look stronger. If a man goes up to her, he has to have balls to go up to her. I don’t like her to be taken advantage of.”
McQueen easily could have been describing a chess queen—the most powerful piece, free to travel over any square, black or white, forward, backward, or sideways. In fact, the designer based his entire Spring/Summer 2005 show on chess, tossing the catwalk in favor of a stage with white squares drawn in light, models crossing it like rooks and bishops. Re-creating it was the initial concept behind “A Queen Within: Adorned Archetypes, Fashion and Chess,” which opens this month at the World Chess Hall of Fame. But when director Susan Barrett approached London-based fashion curator Sofia Hedman—the archivist for The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s ravishing, much-lauded 2011 exhibit “Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty”—she had another idea. Why not explore the queen, the most charismatic piece? And explore her from nine different angles—the same number of pieces that can be queened during a game?
“Carl Jung came up with different archetypes from myths and folktales, so we used them to define what kinds of personalities fit the queen,” Hedman says. “Some of them are very seductive—for example, the enchantress. Another might be very much a warrior outfit, for the heroine theme.”
The other personas are the sage, mother, magician, explorer, ruler, Mother Earth, and orphan. Each persona will have its own themed room, in a series of what Hedman calls “microgeographies,” built on two floors, over 3,200 square feet; they’ll be designed in collaboration with artists Serge Martynov and Karolina Kling and woodcarvers Orlando Campbell and Julius Lightfoot. At the core of the show are a large number of McQueen items, borrowed from a collector in St. Louis.
“The House Alexander McQueen is not part of this exhibition—it’s just this amazing collection of Alexander McQueen pieces,” Hedman explains. “I think it may be the biggest private ones in the world.” She’s also borrowed pieces from Gucci, Gianfranco Ferré, and Viktor & Rolf. But she’s especially excited about including a number of experimental garments from emerging European and Asian designers, many of whom have never shown in America. That includes Iris van Herpen, whose Snake Dress is a spherical tumble of glittering gray serpents, and Charlie Le Mindu, who’s created bespoke headpieces and wigs for the exhibit. The work of these avant-garde designers, she says, “is not trend-based. It’s more built around aesthetic values.”
Those who experiment most successfully, she adds, are often, ironically enough, deeply grounded in tradition and history. Jordan Askill’s Petal Helmet is based on a real 14th-century one (though it’s a good bet the original did not feature detachable glass panthers). One McQueen garment alludes to Hieronymus Bosch’s Haywain Triptych. The exhibit plays with ideas of history and identity, scattering hidden symbols throughout, including references to eyes and ears (symbols of the queen’s fame), snakes (describing her wisdom), and royal portraiture, including Nicholas Hilliard’s “Pelican portrait” of Queen Elizabeth I. Though Hedman looked for clothing that could express the theme of the queen’s many personalities, she primarily sought the exemplary use of color, materials, silhouettes, and ideas. And of course, since McQueen was the jumping-off point, she sought clothing that was beautifully constructed. Though he was one of the most groundbreaking designers of his generation, McQueen’s roots were as a bespoke tailor on London’s Savile Row.
“I always loved Alexander McQueen for his amazing shows, but at the archive, I saw the inside and outside of all the garments,” Hedman says. “And there was some absolutely amazing craftsmanship there. The garments are just as well-built on the inside as out—it’s just this incredible attention to detail.”
“A Queen Within” opens at the World Chess Hall of Fame (4652 Maryland, 314-367-9243, worldchesshof.org) on October 19 at 10 a.m. and runs through April 19. At 1 p.m. on October 19, Washington University hosts Unpredictable Design, a panel moderated by ABC News’ Deborah Roberts, featuring Hedman and Valerie Steele, director of The Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York. To read our Q&A with CHOF Director Susan Barrett, click here.
