Fierce, feathered and fragile: how Alexander McQueen made fashion an art — theguardian.com

The cuirass is a piece of armour that covers the torso – a forerunner of the bullet-proof vest. It was made from tough metal such as bronze or iron to protect the wearer as he went into battle. The fashion designer Alexander McQueen borrowed the shape of the cuirass but made a few tweaks to the design. His cuirasses were designed to emphasise the curves not of male muscles but of female breasts. Instead of metal, McQueen chose other materials. He made breastplates from plaster of Paris, leather and Perspex. For fashion curator Andrew Bolton, the McQueen cuirass that best captures the “tragic, poetic beauty” of his designs is one made of glass: a stunning object but a self-defeating form of armour. If struck, far from fending off the aggressor, a glass cuirass would shatter and pierce the wearer. Just before she went on the runway wearing one of McQueen’s glass corsets, the model Laura Morgan was warned, jokingly, “If you trip, you’re a goner!”

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