Alexander McQueen has released a Spring 2020 campaign art directed by Paris-based agency M/M, with photographs by Jamie Hawkesworth. Created in collaboration with Alexander McQueen Creative Director Sarah Burton, the naturalistic seaside locale and weathered wood interiors speak to the nature-based processes and workmanship embedded within each article of clothing.
“Each look tells its own story. The connection between the clothes is the time it took to make them. I was interested in clarity and paring things down, in the essence of garments – stripping back to the toile. I love the idea of people having the time to make things together, the time to meet and talk together, the time to reconnect with the world.”
— Sarah Burton, Creative Director
Putting the clothes front and center, the campaign aims to draw attention to hand-crafted materials such as the linen, which was laid out in fields to be bleached by the sun and the moon. With jacket, dress and trousers made of black beetled linen, the process entails the making and unmaking of a dress that is hand-painted with potato starch and hammered by wooden blocks in pieces. The linen in this collection is beetled by William Clark, the oldest linen mill in Ireland, and the campaign gently hints at this heritage without explicitly calling it out. The campaign leaves one with the impression of feeling vaguely unquenched, as if there many other stories behind the collection if only one were to dig deeper. Perhaps this is the essence that describes why the campaign is a success, because ultimately the goal is to create with the viewer a feeling of desire, and the feeling of wanting more is precisely what the campaign delivers.
Brand Creative Director | Sarah Burton
Agency | M/M
Photographer | Jamie Hawkesworth
Models | Vivien Solari, Felice Noordhoff, Imaan Hammam