“Damn. You like Kate almost as much as McQueen does,” she said to me in the cramped window seat area of the South Orange Starbucks. We were two strangers, in a too tiny, too busy coffee shop that pushed us into an an awkward setup of two small chairs on either side of a small faux wood coffee table. I put my magazine down on the table and responded, “Fuck him, I love Kate more than anyone.”

She decided to agree with me because we had just met and my emo boy haircut I had at the time made me look crazy enough that you wouldn’t want to argue with me for fear I’d become unhinged with all the angst that was building inside my frail emo boy frame. The mere fact that I could afford a Vogue and Starbucks seemed to be the only thing that would convince a stranger I was somewhat normal and I, at minimum, had a caring mother that I made sit four tables over because I didn’t want to look like a ‘child with his mommy’. I was older than the emo boy haircut would suggest and my mom was back in Upstate New York, but those are all facts that we would never cover in my short Starbucks friend moment.

After I finished my coffee and said goodbye to the girl, I went home and immediately Googled “Kate McQueen,” because I don’t think you could get the internet on your phone back then so you just had to remember shit and hope that your mind didn’t mutate it into something like “Kate McSweeny” and send you on a four hour Googling rampage by the time you got in front of a computer.

There were a TON of ladies named “Kate McQueen” and so I decided I had to be more specific. I typed out “Kate Moss McQueen” and, as the results popped up, I silently cursed Google, “Fucking ‘Kate McQueen’. You really think I was searching for some shitty Midwestern real estate agent, Google? I swear if you keep this bullshit up, I’m Yahoo!ing for the rest of my days.” Luckily, on the computer screen was the name Kate Moss, so I immediately calmed down and started clicking on links.

I recognized the man I was presented with. A shaved head and a messy goatee; an image that gave me an odd feeling that he was someone I went to high school with and not one of fashion’s most influential designers. I had seen him in pictures with Kate, I had heard him mentioned countless times in the magazines I read and I gradually remembered why he was familiar to me, the hologram.

Kate had just been attacked with the coke scandal. It was annoying to hear everyone say, “Oh, that’s how she stayed so skinny,” as these fat pieces of shit who were making the jokes sopped up gravy with handfuls of bread. I wanted to grab them by the chins and be like, “You could have a Scarface sized mountain of coke every morning and you’d still be a fat mess,” but I didn’t because I weighed about 119lbs at the time time and would have easily been crushed.

I remember the gasps of horror when the Mirror video came out and I remember when they were effectively drowned out by the gasps of onlookers as they saw the beautiful “ghost” of Kate fluttering in the center of the runway during McQueen’s show. The applause began when the image appeared and didn’t stop even when it disappeared.

Kate and McQueen had that special creative relationship where they inspired each other. There was something exciting when they collided and people couldn’t help, but notice, copy, follow; like with the skull scarf mania.

I’ve loved fashion for a while and I’m really good with knowing models, but I’ve never been good with designers. Most of the designers that I do know well are the names that everyone knows because of their exposure. Michael Kohrs from Project Runway, Marc Jacobs from the French documentary, Tom Ford from his mutual admiration for starlets that I follow obsessively. I’ve always loved fashion, but I find it very hard to follow designers.

When I started looking through McQueen’s work, it was very distinctive and it was one of the first times that I was able to familiarize myself with a brand, without watching the man behind the brand on TV for an extended period of time.

I’m not going to sit here and tell you about his life, because, outside of the time it intersected with Kate, I don’t really know anything about it. It was sort of like meeting someone through a mutual friend. Your entire opinion of that person is shaped through the lense of the friend that you both share. Sure you can look them up online and check out all the other photos of their life, but you don’t really have a feel for who they are beyond the times the person was plopped in front of you for one reason or another.

There are places that you go to learn about Alexander, I’m not going to discuss the details of his life. I don’t know him well enough to refer to him as Lee.

What I want to do here is talk about his Fall 2006 RTW campaign, which is not only the best McQueen collection, but also one of my favorite collections ever. It contains numerous pieces that really showed an understanding, love and appreciation for HBGWHEMs.

The Fall 2006 McQueen RTW runaway show incorporated four of my top five models. Only missing Lara Stone, this show was a dream assemblage of top models and the pieces that these perfect women wore down that runway absolutely matched their beauty.

I’ve already touched on the epic ending for this show, which featured Kate so that leaves my other three favorite models to walk the runway.

Gemma Ward walked in two different pieces. The first piece was a timeless coat that was so striking it took me a minute to notice the bird feathers on Gemma in the picture. This was a perfect marriage of the beauty of a flawlesslessy made garment, the beauty of nature’s most majestic of animals and the beauty of this young, almost otherworldly girl.

The second piece she walked in never registers with me because Gemma’s hair is pulled back so that the butterflies can rest on her and it’s an image that is so captivating, it boarders on distracting. The nymphish, fairy feel this walk by Gemma gives me is magic. It’s truly a testament that McQueen was concious both of the “fashion” and the “show”.

Sasha only walks once for this collection, but the piece that she wears is my second favorite of the plaid prints from McQueen’s F06RTW. I can’t imagine another model fitting this piece as perfectly as Sasha does. It truly looks like it’s made for her and would be tragically stolen if any other women in the world was to wear the dress. The heavy purplish blush works exceptionally with Sasha’s face structure and a lesser model may risk looking zombish in the same shades that give Sasha life.

My favorite dress of the plaids introduced me to Querelle Jansen, the model who walked in the piece. Before this Querelle was a dark cholocate brunette aka irrelevant. She always had freckles that seemed to contradict her hair color and when she walked out on that runway with bleach blonde and the masterpiece red plaid dress, she was a model reborn. Visually perfect, this is when Querelle went from model to HBWHEM. Sadly, she has since dyed her hair, but this photograph can be a testiment to Querelle’s incredible work of the past.

My final favorite, Caroline Trentini walked in an imperfectly perfect piece that is absolutely RTW and would stop most people in their tracks if you were to pass someone wearing it in the streets. Wearing a reverse mohawk of features, Caroline’s freckles are covered with a pale makeup that gives her a skin tone that perfectly compliments the wardrobe, as if she was born in these clothes, hatched from a golden egg.

The red plaid in these pieces floored me and I found that the print was stuck in my head. It was distintly unschoolgirl plaid and I started becoming obsessed with how I could work it into my wardrobe. After online searching, mall hopping Jersey’s many, many malls, I was finally able to find a tie that replicated the pattern I fell in love with.

Inspiring and absolutely unique, Alexander McQueen was incredibly gifted and dedicated to fashion. His devotion didn’t begin and end with material and thread, it was obvious in his personal relationships as well. Alexander was best friends with Queen Kate and knowing that, immediately you know that he had an eye for HBGWHEMs. He didn’t just use them for his work, he appreciated them as the rare and exquisite creatures they are.

In 2005, displaying a beautiful show of support, Alexander did his ss06 walk out in a “We Love You Kate” shirt, a gesture that was important as it was kind.

So, yeah, in the end, the girl at Starbucks was right, I do like Kate almost as much as McQueen did.

In memory of Alexander McQueen