Death
On May 6, 2007, during a weekend house party at Hilles, where the guests included Treacy and his life partner, Stefan Bartlett, Blow announced that she was going shopping. Instead, she was later discovered collapsed on a bathroom floor by her sister Lavinia and was taken to Gloucestershire Royal Hospital, where Blow told the doctor she had drunk the weedkiller Paraquat. Blow died at the hospital the following day.
Blow's death was initially reported as being caused by ovarian cancer; however, a coroner later ruled the death a suicide. At the inquest, Blow's sister, Lavinia Verney, stated that after she discovered her sister had ingested the poison, Blow had told her, "I'm worried that I haven't taken enough."
After her death, Detmar Blow confirmed that his wife suffered from depression and that she had once declared, "I'm fighting depression and I can't beat it".
Her funeral was held at Gloucester Cathedral on May 15, 2007. Her coffin, made of willow, was surmounted by one of her Philip Treacy hats instead of a floral tribute, and her pallbearers included her godson Otis Ferry, a son of the rock star Bryan Ferry. (In 2010, Bryan Ferry dedicated his Olympia album in memoriam Isabella Blow and David Williams.) Actor Rupert Everett and actress Joan Collins delivered eulogies. A memorial service was held in the Guards Chapel in London on September 18, 2007, where Anna Wintour and Geordie Greig spoke. Wintour's eulogy and part of the memorial service can be seen in DVD disc 2 of The September Issue.
Read more about this topic: Isabella Blow
Famous quotes containing the word death:
“For, surely, surely, where
Your voice and graces are,
Nothing of death can any feel or know.”
—Walter Savage Landor (1775–1864)
“Go; and if that word have not quite killed thee,
Ease me with death by bidding me got too.
Oh, if it have, let my word work on me,
And a just office on a murderer do.
Except it be too late to kill me so,
Being double dead: going, and bidding go.”
—John Donne (1572–1631)
“A rat crept softly through the vegetation
Dragging its slimy belly on the bank
While I was fishing in the dull canal
On a winter evening round behind the gashouse
Musing upon the king my brother’s wreck
And on the king my father’s death before him.”
—T.S. (Thomas Stearns)