Alexander McQueen and the Met.

I feel so fortunate to have had the opportunity to see a true legend's work on display at the Met recently. My floormates and I took a trip down to the Metropolitan Museum of Art on the Upper East Side and had the chance to experience the Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty exhibit. Now, I'm not a very big "museum person," in that I usually get bored and want to move on after about an hour, however, we spent an hour and a half looking at the exhibit alone, not including the additional hour we waited in line just to get in.

This was one of the most breathtaking experiences I have ever had. There's something about this legend's work that inspires such awe and deep thought about what's behind it. His pieces show such emotion and each one truly tells a story. Never have I had such a profound respect for a designer. Not only did he create beautiful masterpiece works of art in the form of clothing, he translated the emotions and even political statements through his craft.

I have always been a Coco Chanel fan at my core, but I have to say, she now shares that place with Alexander McQueen. I would wear any dress or headpiece at that exhibit and there was just something about his works that I felt so instantly connected to. I truly admire him.

And aesthetically, the exhibit itself was so beautifully laid out. On the ledge of each section were plaques that had quotes from McQueen about his thought process behind his creations or just about life in general. Then there was a description of each item placed in front of it on the ledge while the whole time haunting and beautifully eerie music played in surround sound.

What was more, is that it wasn't even just walking through and looking at all the dresses (some of which were worn by the likes of Lady Gaga, etc.). Rather, it was interactive. There were video screens everywhere playing scenes from the spectacular McQueen fashion shows of the past, there was a section where you watched three-dimensional prisms and light beams take shape into an actual human adorned in a white McQueen gown and there was a true political statement made when you went up to one wall in the exhibit and saw the dresses on display, only to see the lights inside the huge glass box dim to show a movie on the back wall. In the movie, the steel walls surrounding a model slowly fell to the floor, cuing the glass box to then change lighting once again and become a mirror that reflects your own self-image. The description explained how McQueen wanted to express his desire for one to look at one's own reflection and image in the mirror, and what better way for the exhibit to do that than to lure us in with a video and then switch what we're watching to be ourselves. So artistic, so brilliant and so frankly clever.

I could have spent another two hours in that exhibit and would wait in line all over again to go back. If you're in NYC I would more than highly recommend taking a trip to the Met to see it before it leaves on August 7th.

If you can't make it to see it in person, check out the official blog and while you're at it, check out this awesome article from Vogue on the Three Must-See Fashion Exhibitions of the summer!

Love and Style,
L.M.