The world needs fantasy, not reality. We have enough reality today
I think there is beauty in everything. What 'normal' people would perceive as ugly, I can usually see something of beauty in it.
People don't want to see clothes, they want to see something that fuels the imagination.
Style is not about the clothes, it's about the individual
You've got to know the rules to break them. That's what I'm here for, to demolish the rules but to keep the tradition.
Fashion should be a form of escapism, and not a form of imprisonment.
I want people to be afraid of the women I dress.
There is no better designer than nature
There comes a time in your life when you focus solely on what you believe is right, regardless of what everybody else is doing.
I use things that people want to hide in their heads. War, religion, sex; things we all think about, but don’t bring to the forefront. But I do and I force them to watch it
Fashion is self confident and fearless.
I oscillate between life and death, happiness and sadness, good and evil.
Give me time and I'll give you a revolution.
For me, what I do is an artistic expression which is channeled through me. Fashion is just the medium.
It is important to look at death because it is a part of life. It is a sad thing, melancholy but romantic at the same time. It is the end of a cycle - everything has to end. The cycle of life is positive because it gives room for new things.
I'm the pink sheep in the family.
Beauty can come from the strangest of places, even the most disgusting of places.
If you're lucky enough to use something you see in a dream, it is purely original. It's not in the world - it's in your head. I think that is amazing.
You can only go forward by making mistakes.
Of course I make mistakes. I'm human. If I didn't make mistakes, I'd never learn. You can only go forward by making mistakes.
I am constantly trying to reflect the way women are treated. It's hard to interpret that in clothes or in a show but there's always an underlying, sinister side to women's sexuality in my work because of the way I have seen women treated in my life. Where I come from, a woman met a man, had babies, moved to Dagenham, two up two down, made the dinner, went to bed. That was my image of women and I didn't want that. I wanted to get that out of my head.
I find beauty in melancholy.
There's beauty in anger, and anger for me is a passion.
When I'm dead and gone, people will know that the twenty-first century was started by Alexander McQueen.
It's a new era in fashion - there are no rules. It's all about the individual and personal style, wearing high-end, low-end, classic labels, and up-and-coming designers all together.
