Gods and Kings

The Rise and Fall of Alexander McQueen and John Galliano

By: Dana Thomas

Narrated by: Elizabeth Sastre

In February 2011 John Galliano, the lauded head of Christian Dior, imploded with a drunken, anti-Semitic public tirade. Exactly a year earlier, celebrated designer Alexander McQueen took his own life three weeks before his women's wear show. Both were casualties of the war between art and commerce that has raged within fashion for the last two decades.

In the mid-1990s, Galliano and McQueen arrived on the fashion scene when the business was in an artistic and economic rut. They shook the establishment out of its bourgeois, minimalist stupor with daring, sexy designs and theatrical fashion shows. They had similar backgrounds: sensitive, shy gay men raised in tough London neighborhoods, their love of fashion nurtured by their doting mothers. By 1997 both had landed jobs as creative directors for couture houses owned by French tycoon Bernard Arnault, chairman of LVMH.

Galliano's and McQueen's work not only influenced fashion; their distinct styles were reflected across the media landscape. With their help luxury fashion evolved from a clutch of small, family-owned businesses into a $280 billion-a-year global corporate industry. Executives pushed the designers to meet increasingly rapid deadlines. For both Galliano and McQueen, the pace was unsustainable.

The same week that Galliano was fired, Forbes named Arnault the fourth richest man in the world. Two months later, in the wake of McQueen's death, Kate Middleton wore a McQueen wedding gown, instantly making the house the world's most famous fashion brand, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art opened a wildly successful McQueen retrospective, cosponsored by the corporate owners of the McQueen brand. The corporations had won, and the artists had lost.

In her groundbreaking work Gods and Kings, acclaimed journalist Dana Thomas tells the true story of McQueen and Galliano. In so doing she reveals the relentless world of couture.

©2015 Dana Thomas (P)2015 Recorded Books

This Book is EVERYTHING

I work in fashion and these two are geniuses. I thoroughly enjoyed this from beginning to end. I cannot stop thinking about it. I even enjoyed the narration. Loved it.

Wow!

Worth every single penny. A stunning story, brilliantly narrated. I highly recommend this to any lover of the fashion industry.

Great reading and story

I thought the information was really well research and written, and the reading was fabulous.

Tormented Genius

Fascinating
It reminded you that there is a lot more to fashion than clothes and the artist and the art that it takes to create wearable art

Fascinating and beautifully read

Excellent history and insight into the lives of two of the most extraordinary talents in fashion. The narrator does a brilliant job. Worth every minute.

Important story told well!

I read this right after 'the beautiful fall' and it was so appropriate! I'm glad I went audio because her pronunciation of French and Italian phrases was beautiful!

Deeply researched, narratively rich and excellent

The story this book tells is as romantic, exciting, and insightful as it is heartbreaking. Dana Thomas gives an unflinching assessment of the fashion industry through the lives of two of its greats. I couldn’t stop listening.

Fascinating

An extraordinary story about art, commerce, talent and the shadow. Very much enjoyed the narration as well.

Loved everything about this book .

Well written, extremely well read I couldn’t it the book down.
I plan to read it a second time.
Highly recommend!

i really enjoyed this book.

very interesting to listen to the contrasting upbringings of each designer and their evolving collections. great read, even greater listen. although, by the end of it, you will want to describe every detail of your day in a british accent.