YVES SAINT LAURENT

Yves Saint Laurent 

"Chanel freed women, and I empowered them", the mythical designer, dubbed one of the most important fashion figures of the second half of the 20th century, once said of himself. Indeed, like Coco Chanel's game-changing designs one generation earlier, when he opened his namesake brand in 1961, Yves Saint Laurent bent the rules and created the wardrobe of the contemporary woman. His legacy immediately evokes a sense of duality and the image of a worldly, powerful woman, completely in tune with social moods, perhaps leading a double life. He gave the fashion world gender-bending sophistication and encapsulated the culture of the 1960s in his clothes. His clothes came to reflect the designer's own rebellious, controversial lifestyle, and the spirit of youthfulness and modernity during his time. The culture that Saint Laurent propagated and numerous elements of his designs were absorbed into the mainstream of fashion and lived on to have an everlasting influence.  

After Yves Saint Laurent opened his own atelier, the clothes he made were steeped in the culture and the arts of the 1960s. The designer debuted several colour-blocked wool shift dresses in 1965 infamously known as the Mondrian shifts, inspired by paintings of Piet Mondrian. The dresses were widely embraced by buyers and manufacturers, particularly in America, and became one of the most copied designs in the world (http://www.vogue.com/voguepedia/Yves_Saint_Laurent_(Brand)). Saint Laurent also did dresses influenced by Andy Warhol's pop art, featuring designs of lips and hearts. The designer believed that the trend of fashion pointed toward youthfulness and worldliness, and his work very much reflected that belief. He explored the elements of different parts of the world, including peasant blouses and military trench coats from Marrakech and Russia, appropriated and elevated them in his own clothes. Yet when thinking of Yves Saint Laurent, perhaps his most influential and at the time, scandalous work came from his adopting of menswear for women. In 1966, his creation of the le smoking suit put women in a full on tuxedo pantsuit. He paired the look with stilettos and fedoras, and it ironically highlighted the sensuous side of a woman's femininity. The look was empowering, and attracted a throng of powerful, unconventional women to the brand, who all came to define the Yves Saint Laurent woman. 

Also in 1966, Yves Saint Laurent opened his Rive Gauche prêt-à-porter, or ready-to-wear, boutique that sold his designs directly to the public. It was the first mass-produced ready-to-wear line by a couturier (http://www.vogue.com/voguepedia/Yves_Saint_Laurent_(Brand)). The line set the brand apart from couture and from the bourgeois spirit, and cemented its focus on modernity and on the youth.  

Yves Saint Laurent not only made himself into a brand and his brand an empire, but he also propagated a frenzy that became a kind of culture. “It was a glamorous, sensual era when there were no barriers and no limits,” recalled designer Christian Lacroix, a student during the time, and the women all dressed in Saint Laurent. And particularly for the designer, it was a time of drama, and of ups and downs, as the wild, carefree lifestyle he promoted was matched on the other end by great emotional turmoils, and spiraling depression. 

YSL Mondrian shift dresses

YSL le smoking pantsuit

 

Stefano Pilati 

A successor of the Yves Saint Laurent empire needs not only to be able to interpret the fashion house's historical archives, but also the culture and spirit of the clothes. After attempts from Alber Elbaz and Tom Ford, Italian designer Stefano Pilati tried his take on the brand in 2004. Toward the beginning of the career, he did indeed create rather influential shapes, and steered the brand toward a much more grown-up, mature direction. His version of the tulip skirt trickled down to affect many other designers, and he brought out much of the bright colours and colour-blocking from Yves Saint Laurent history. His designs of body-enhancing, ruffled dresses and his use of leopard print embodied the much more mature, "hypersexed" direction he took the brand. The gold, overlapping YSL logo blazed clear during Pilati's era, and the brand's commercialism was reflected in the success of brand's accessories business, particularly of handbags and shoes. Although Stefano Pilati experienced several successes at Yves Saint Laurent, his work toward the end of his time became much more confusing and lacking in a clear direction with too much going on, all of which his predecessor would eliminate with a few clear, drastic strokes.

Hedi Slimane 

When Hedi Slimane came on as the artistic director for Yves Saint Laurent in 2012, the fashion house was in for a huge change and revamp, beginning from the most literal and controversial sense. Slimane sent the world a message loud and clear that things were going to be different when at the very beginning of his time, the house of Yves Saint Laurent became just Saint Laurent Paris. The blazing YSL logo emblazoned everywhere was no more, and in its place were three tiny, discreet words. What followed was great public outcry, but also one of the most dramatic streamlining of a fashion house and more importantly, a brand, ever to be done before. Slimane's designs for Saint Laurent became a full embodiment of his own very specific history, culture and lifestyle. He reworked the fashion house as a brand, targeted and settled into an extremely distinct place in the fashion world.


Before his current role at Saint Laurent, Hedi Slimane had already made a name for himself at Saint Laurent menswear, and Dior Homme, Dior's mens line. He was a sensation in the early 2000s, and made the fashion press awe-struck with his "blade-slim, blackened silhouettes" (http://www.vogue.com/voguepedia/Hedi_Slimane) dubbed "the slender Slimane look". It was exactly this history and talent with menswear that Slimane brought with him to head up Saint Laurent in 2012, that gave him an edge and also a special connection with the history of Yves Saint Laurent. In addition, his own lifestyle and culture have a heavy influence on the aesthetic changes that he brought to the house. Saint Laurent's designs have been heavily influenced by music, musicians, with whom Slimane himself often spends time with and is most inspired by, as well as the lifestyle that goes along with it all. He brought a retro, rocker-inspired style to the brand, and also placed a special emphasis on androgyny. He has persistently delivered simple, pared down designs, looks that do not necessarily feel new in any way, but rather feel like the best versions of items that consumers already know they love. For his debut Spring 2013 Ready-To-Wear collection, clearly certain connections to the traditional Yves Saint Laurent could be seen, yet the show channelled a sixties or seventies rocker theme, as well as a deeply gothic tinge inspired by the city of Los Angeles and its youth. For Fall 2013 Ready-To-Wear, Slimane delivered"California grunge", and thus cementing the image of the new Saint Laurent woman and the Saint Laurent brand.

It seems that Hedi Slimane's streamlining of the Yves Saint Laurent name says it all. He took something that was really all over the place, and stripped it down to have a very specific focus. The woman who Slimane is designing for and the one he is selling to, there is no doubt about who she is. Also with his relocating of the Saint Laurent headquarters to Los Angeles, he makes very clear both his artistic and business direction for the brand. It comes as no surprise that Saint Laurent has been doing exceptionally well commercially under Slimane's lead, for what he accomplished was a smart re-branding, and a smart business move.

 Spring 2013 Ready-To-Wear

Fall 2013 Ready-To-Wear