Alexander McQueen Resort 2015

Review by Lauren Sherman
The term festival dressing has earned itself quite the negative connotation, thanks to too many bad floral wreaths and a proliferation of ill-fitting jorts. Yet Sarah Burton's "festival floral" digital print—the linchpin of McQ Resort—managed to take the staid idea and turn it on its drunken head. Among the flowers there were cigarette butts, crushed bottles of water, and errant soda tabs. In other words, what real festival grounds look like.

That subversive attitude permeated this lineup, from the shirred chiffon crepe on the front of a boyish bomber jacket to the white shirt printed with an image from Alexander McQueen's 1996 Dante collection. Zippers on a black knit dress opened wide to expose lots of skin on the sides of the torso. On another dress—done in the aforementioned festival floral—they unzipped completely into a top and skirt that could be worn as separates.

There was a street element, too. Long skater shorts were paired with a giant olive anorak made out of a super-lightweight parachute silk, and an oversize pale blue shearing motorcycle jacket was worn over a sheer black dress. Indeed, the collection nicely ping-ponged between feminine and masculine silhouettes. Which, if you are going to a festival, happens to be a fitting look.