The Salve of Human Vulnerability
John Galliano and Alexander McQueen
Through intense rivalries triggering competitive innovation, the Madmen of Fashion have not only reshaped style and culture: These rivalries often push our concepts of ourselves, providing costume for our drama. Madmen of Art Mondays examines the fashion industry’s role of writing our lived mythology as we approached the turn of the twentieth century.
After war and plague, it was the role of fashion to reintroduce the world to its own elegance, reminding humanity of the grace it had almost lost.
Once upon a time, in the gilded kingdoms of Paris and London, two extraordinary weavers of dreams arose, each determined to clothe the world not only in fabric but in purpose. They were not mere tailors— they were magicians, storytellers and architects of identity: John Galliano, ever the Protagonist’s Dream, and Alexander McQueen, known as the Enfant Terrible. They could not have been more different—or more alike.
Galliano spun stories of escapism, crafting garments transforming wearers into the characters for an epic drama of their own making. His designs whispered of romance, decadence and beauty so profound, so powerful, one could face life’s cruelties armed only with the audacity of their elegance. If “Style always wins out in the end,” 1 Galliano embodied this truth. At the House of Dior, he took the legacy of Christian Dior—the man who once resurrected a broken postwar world with the promise of the New Look—steering it into a modern fantasia. Here, Galliano’s creations were the dreams that dared to soar, ethereal yet unyielding, to the face of casual Fridays declaring, “You’re not your khakis.”2
Then comes McQueen, the storm raging against the vulnerability of existence. His designs were armor—dark, sharp and uncompromising. “Hope is a mistake,”3 whisper the haunting shadows of a dystopian world, looming over the end of the twentieth century. In McQueen’s fashion, hope was not mistaken; it was armed. His collections at Givenchy and later under his eponymous label were battle cries for the human spirit, offering garments of protection as much as provocation. Chains, leather and barbed silhouettes reminded wearers survival was not a gentle art. And yet, even in their brutality, his works sang of poetry—a haunting requiem for the wounded and the resilient alike.
Their rivalry began not with swords but with sewing needles and scissors; not with duels and fields of battle but with runways and collections. Galliano, the Dior master, and McQueen, the Givenchy disruptor, were entrusted with steering two of fashion’s most sacred houses into a new era. Their tasks were monumental, for these houses were no ordinary ateliers—they were cathedrals of civilization reborn.
Galliano’s brilliance was in spinning the tale, dressing the heroine whose mantra is, “Free your mind,”4 as she dons a gown part sheathing, part dreamscape. McQueen, meanwhile, constructing the battlefield itself, providing the tools to endure the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. “We are not things,”5 becomes the flagrant battle-cry of the female urban warrior; McQueen’s work echoes this sentiment with every stitch.
But their differences were also their edges, sharpening each other in ways both brutal and brilliant. Galliano created worlds where his wearers could escape—no, transcend—their realities. He provided them with a shield made of beauty, saying perhaps, “You’ll go insane”6 without a way to fix what’s broken, but let us escape anyway, in this moment. McQueen, by contrast, never flinches from the truth. He thrusts his wearers into the harshest light of day, offering not escape— but the tools to endure.
And so, they warred—not with hatred, but with the intensity of two stars orbiting the same blazing sun. Galliano’s Jungle Red-inspired escapades and McQueen’s Savage Beauty collections collided in clashing philosophies. One dressed the protagonist who could charm the world; the other armed the warrior who could break it. Their rivalry, if one could call it that, was not just about clothes—it was about the soul. It asked,
What does it mean to be vulnerable in a world that demands strength?
What does it mean to armor oneself not with steel but with silk?
What does it mean to fight—to live—when the battle is both within and without?
Perhaps Galliano and McQueen were not actually adversaries? They present two halves of the same whole, their legacies weaving a tapestry of humanity’s struggle and grace. As McQueen’s designs roared, “There is no spoon,”7 forcing us to deal with reality, Galliano’s declare, “I’m singing in the rain,”8 even as the rain might be acid. In this fairy tale, as in all great stories, there is no victor—only the unending dance of creation and survival.
In the end, the rivalry between Alexander McQueen and John Galliano transcends mere competition—it becomes a shared mission to arm humanity against its deepest vulnerabilities. McQueen’s creations, primal and defiant, offered armor for survival in a brutal world, while Galliano’s theatrical elegance wrapped the soul in beauty and escapism, a whispered assurance fragility can also be strength. Together, they redefined fashion not just as adornment but as a force which shields and empowers, helping us navigate the chaos of life. Their legacy reminds us that, whether through McQueen’s battle cries or Galliano’s poetic flourishes, fashion can be the ultimate answer to vulnerability—a salve for our wounds, a celebration of our scars. “It’s only after we’ve lost everything that we’re free to do anything.”9 Through their genius, McQueen and Galliano gave us the freedom to face life’s battles, adorned with the confidence to conquer.
References—
Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty, Andrew Bolton
Gods and Kings: The Rise and Fall of Alexander McQueen and John Galliano, Dana Thomas
The Fashion System, Roland Barthes
Velvet Goldmine (1998)
Fight Club (1999)
Mad Max (1979)
The Matrix (1999)
Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)
Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)
The Matrix (1999)
Clockwork Orange (1971)
Fight Club (1999)