This year, amongst all the flurry and excitement of London Fashion Week, a dark shadow loomed over the tents. A critical figure in the British design world was missing. On Monday the 20th of September, right in the middle of fashion week, a gathering of family, friends and fellow designers met at Saint Paul's Cathedral in London to remember a young legend, a true artist; the late Lee Alexander McQueen. Bjork covered "Gloomy Sunday" for the star-studded audience which included McQueen's friends and muses Kate Moss and Daphne Guinness, and American Vogue's Anna Wintour addressed the crowd.
After the 40-year old designer took his own life in February, the fashion world was in shock and the future of the label was put in question. Since then the designing duties have been passed on to the very capable Sarah Burton, who had long worked with McQueen, and the brand lived on. This Spring Summer 2011 season will be the first full women's collection with Burton as head designer. The fashion world holds its breath until we find out if she too is capable of making, as Anna Wintour put it at the ceremony, "[the] most exquisite couture dresses and at the same time...a real impact on how the world dressed".

by Emma Freed