McQueen Spring Summer 2025: creating the Banshee Hair
An innovative textile development from inside the McQueen atelier.
Discover innovation at the heart of the Spring Summer 2025 collection, animating the mythological figure that inspired it.
The banshee, embedded within the house’s history and the Irish heritage of creative director Seán McGirr, is woven into fabric of the collection, inspiring the intricate techniques used throughout. Echoing its lore is the ‘banshee hair’ embroidery, wisplike and featherlight, embodying the powerful iconography of the figure’s wind-whipped hair, as she stands tall among nature.
'The banshee is rooted in the history of McQueen, but it's also a story that I grew up with, so feels deeply personal to me - something I remember my mother talking about in Ireland. describing the cry of this solidarity, foreboding figure. For me, she has come to represent something real and potent now. The idea of someone who is feeling and forthright; someone who can be seen as a guiding force.' - Seán McGirr, creative director.
The McQueen atelier drew inspiration from the banshee’s comb, an object embedded in Celtic folk tales, as well as throughout the collection , describing the banshee as combing her hair with a gleaming silver comb.
The process of the ‘banshee hair’ embroidery required innovative textile manipulation, delicately teasing sections of organza with a fine-toothed comb and massaging the fabric by hand. The resulting texture is a tactile hair-like finish —an intricate evocation of the banshee, and the creativity, storytelling and innovation at the heart of McQueen.