ALEXANDER McQUEEN put everything he had into last night's super-elegant Black party, celebrating five years of the American Express Centurion Card in London - including more than a few thousand pounds from his own pocket. Three years since leaving the capital to present his collections in Paris, the designer drew the great and the glamorous (most dressed in black, though McQueen himself was in white) to the usually clinical Earls Court 2 (transformed into a luxuriant black, chandeliered ballroom) to watch a magnificent one-off show, featuring his greatest hits in Amex black: models stalked diagonally across a glass room (first seen at the Asylum show), parading torturous Shaun Leane silver jewellery and designs from his 1995 Highland collection onwards. Closing with typical dramatic effect on a virginal creature in a crown of thorns and a gossamer white gown, shivering in a heaven-sent downpour, it was a glorious retrospective - though seeing Kate Moss, with Charlie Girl waves, performance-art-dancing was a first. "She looked like a pro," sighed Plum Sykes, among a crowd of other admirers. At the black auction afterwards, Sykes and beau Toby Rowlands also bid long and hard for Sam Taylor-Wood's dramatic print of Kate, but lost out to McQueen, who seemed unwilling to let any of the lots he had helped to amass (including a few he had actually donated) go to other homes. It was he who also snapped up Tracey Emin's "It will be OK, OK" tapestry, a snip at £9,000 (despite McQueen outbidding himself by £500 at one stage) - and point-blank refused to sell to the guest he finally beat to the prize later in the evening. "No way, Tracey made it for me," he said, before disappearing in triumph backstage. There was less enthusiasm - at least initially - for Madonna's fishnets, which had to be offered twice before serious bidders took the bait. But the Queen of Pop will be delighted to hear that her lot caused the biggest furore in the end: one exuberant guest had to be taken in hand, after whipping them off the S&M-style red plastic legs that modelled them on an shiny black egg chair. (June 4 2004, AM)
