Power House to Power Suit: #YvesSaintLaurent The History of the House.

Yves Saint Laurent kickstarted his career in luxury fashion when he landed his first job at Christin Dior as a design assistant. Soon after took the place of creative director in 1957 when the founder suddenly died.

Yves Saint Laurent launched his own brand in 1961, originally a House of Haute Couture, and is still known for the first house to announce prêt-à-porter collection 1966. He revolutionized women’s clothing and the way fashion and society merge. The House introduced Rive Gauche as a merely watered-down version of Saint Laurent’s couture to present to women “wardrobe essentials”. As Saint Laurent himself explained in 1972, “What is modern in clothes today is to have a skirt, pants, shirt, sweater, coat, and raincoat and to mix everything”. Inspired through the structure of menswear with an approach to honor gender fluidity.

Image by Vogue.

Over the years Yves Saint Laurent has held various designer tenures that thread the label together. Taking over from the founder himself in 1998, Alber Elbaz with a short-lived stint as Gucci purchased the YSL brand in 1999 under the creative direction of Tom Ford infusing the label with his signature sexy drawl. Followed by Italy’s Stefano Pilati in 2004, who faithfully reworked Saint Laurent’s Le Smoking throughout the Noughties. Hedi Slimane’s brand overhaul in 2012, dropping the “Yves” as the House rebranded to Saint Laurent and revived its couture by infusing a youthful, yet controversial rock-tinged allure.

The House is now under the creative vision of Anthony Vaccarello and the leadership of Francesca Bellettini. With a natural creative connection of the brand’s spirit, together they strongly empowered a highly desirable vision. The history of the house was defined by the founder’s Le Smoking tuxedo, Vaccarello continues to take masculine themes and transform them for a feminine wardrobe.

First Tuxedo

Le Smoking

Images by Musée Yves Saint Laurent Paris.

Vaccarello marked a return to elegance with his “Women’s Winter 23 Show” in Paris for Saint Laurent in the Trocadero Gardens adjacent to the Eiffel Tower, with his commitment to showcasing his very Parisian vision of real style you can count on. The collection updated the House codes from the past by celebrating female power with business suits compromising a blazer and A-line dresses with sharp angles underpinning silhouettes of femininity throughout. Formidable straight shoulders and sexy front slit jupe skirts cut above the knee, crafted in the tailoring cloths of the classic men’s wardrobe staying true to evoking the founder’s philosophy.

FALL 2023 READY-TO-WEAR

FALL 2023 READY-TO-WEAR

FALL 2023 READY-TO-WEAR

Images by Vogue Runway.

The brand has developed an androgynous modern perspective bringing the fashion house into the future, designed to empower its wearer.