For many, Alexander McQueen's Spring/Summer 1998 show is one of the greatest fashion moments ever orchestrated.
Originally called
Golden Shower,
the show showed incisive silhouettes carried by lifeless models, in a skillfully orchestrated uneasiness.
The tension reached its apotheosis with pouring rain pouring on the podium.
A radical exploration tinged with fetishistic references to which the young Gisele, 18, was not ready to confront herself.
In a video for the English edition of
Vogue
magazine , the Brazilian top looks back on this first London fashion show, calling it "one of the most traumatic moments of (her) life".
On this day in September 1997, Gisele Bündchen, arrives backstage at the first London fashion show that she managed to win.
“I remember doing all these castings, and no one was looking at my book because the aesthetic at the time was that of a 'heroine chic' and of course I had nothing to do with that,” recalls she in her interview for
Vogue
.
When the young Brazilian finds herself facing one of the three outfits that had been assigned to her, she collapses.
Full screen
Gisele Bündchen parades for the first time in London for Alexander McQueen.
(London, September 1997.) Getty
It was a top made of yarn, worn with a silver thong.
"I asked, 'Is this part of a t-shirt?'" recalls the 41-year-old model.
No, that was it.
I started to cry."
She then talks about a catastrophic make-up session between large and false eyelashes and her prayers that her father will never see her in this outfit revealing her chest.
“Someone had had the idea of dressing him in a latex top for his last visit, clearly signing the end of his innocence,” recalls Tim Blanks in an article for
Business of Fashion
.
"The only thing I wanted was to leave, but, you know, it's this kind of experience that makes you stronger," comments Gisele Bündchen.
A few years later, in 2000, the model became an Angel of the Victoria's Secret lingerie brand.
And a top model idolized for her sculpted body and standard of a healthy screw on which she regained power, with all the success that we know of.