For the last couple of years, the majority of Alexander McQueen’s advertising campaigns have been shot by esteemed photographer David Sims. For AW16 however, the brand has gone in a different direction, enlisting one of fashion photography’s rising stars, Jamie Hawkesworth. A favourite of Dazed, the Surrey-born photographer has shot campaigns for Miu Miu and regularly collaborates with J.W.Anderson on campaigns for his eponymous label and coffee table worthy lookbooks for Spanish luxury house Loewe, where the designer is creative director.

This is Hawkesworth’s inaugural campaign for Alexander McQueen and for it, he travelled to the Shetland Islands, the northernmost point of the British Isles. Here, with the Shetland’s rugged terrain as a backdrop, he shot Argentinian beauty Mica Arganaraz who models a strict white blazer, a ruffled dress in black lace and a semi-translucent gown embellished with crystals.

Shooting in this way has become something of a trademark for Hawkesworth. Ever since starting out in the field of fashion photography, travel has been a central part of his work – for one of his first shoots, for example he travelled to Newcastle with a bag of clothes (and stylist Benjamin Bruno) and simply shot the garments on people he encountered throughout the day.

Alexander McQueen’s AW16 collection itself, which was debuted at London Fashion Week in February, saw creative director Sarah Burton look to the nocturnal. “It’s about obsessions and things that come out at night,” she said on the collection, speaking in an interview with AnOther. “Dreams and reality, surrealism, vanity, unicorns, moths, butterflies, flowers…”

alexandermcqueen.com