Alexander McQueen

36 collections in 18 years. Four British Designer of the Year awards. The "bumster" trousers. The skull scarf. A 2011 retrospective at the Met draws 661,509 visitors, making it the museum's most attended fashion exhibit ever.

Born Lee Alexander McQueen in Lewisham, London, the youngest of six children. His father drives taxis. Lee sketches dresses on the back of his homework from age three.

Graduates from Central Saint Martins. His entire MA collection is bought on the spot by Isabella Blow, the fashion editor who'd become his patron and lifelong friend. She pays 5,000 pounds for everything.

Named head designer at Givenchy, replacing John Galliano. He calls the house's legacy "irrelevant" in his first press conference. Paris is scandalized. He wins British Designer of the Year the same week.

Sells 51% of his company to the Gucci Group. The deal lets him open boutiques worldwide while keeping creative control. His shows feature robots spray-painting a model's white dress on a revolving platform.

Isabella Blow kills herself by drinking weed killer. McQueen is devastated. His next collection, "La Dame Bleue," is a memorial to her. He later says he never fully recovers from the loss.

Found dead by suicide in his Mayfair flat, nine days after his mother's death. He is 40. His unfinished final collection is completed by Sarah Burton and shown at Paris Fashion Week.