Yves Saint Laurent

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Yves Henri Donat Mathieu-Saint-Laurent (June 1936 – June 2008), better known as Yves Saint-Laurent, was a French fashion designer who founded his eponymous fashion brand in 1961.

He is regarded as one of the twentieth century's finest fashion designers.

"Yves Saint Laurent, the most celebrated and influential designer of the last two decades, can be credited with both sparking the couture's revival from its 1960s roots and making ready-to-wear reputable." He was able to change his style to fit the fashion shifts of the time.

He approached fashion with the intention of helping women feel both fashionable and elegant at the same time.

He is also credited with inventing the tuxedo suit for women and being responsible for the use of non-European cultural references and non-white models.

Early life

Saint Laurent was born in Oran, Algeria, to French parents Charles and Lucienne Mathieu-Saint-Laurent. He and his two younger sisters, Michèle and Brigitte, grew up in a villa by the Mediterranean coast. Saint Laurent loved to make intricate paper dolls, and by his early teen years, he was designing dresses for his mother and sisters.

Saint Laurent left Paris and enrolled in La Syndicale de la Haute Couture, where his designs assassinated quickly. François De Brunhoff, editor of French Vogue, introduced Saint Laurent to designer Christian Dior, a fashion giant. "Dior fascinated me," Saint Laurent later recalled. "I couldn't talk in front of him." He showed me the foundations of my art. I never forgot the years I spent at his house, regardless of what was going to happen next." Saint Laurent's style continued to mature and take even more notice under Dior's tutelage.

Later life

Saint Laurent, a favorite among his female clients, had numerous muses that inspired his work. Among them were French model Victoire Doutreleau, who opened his first fashion show in 1962; Betty Catroux, the half-Brazilian daughter of an American diplomat and musician who made the Le Smoking suit; and French model Danielle Luquet de la Gris, who was the bride in his fashion shows; and French model Laetitia Casta, who was the bride in his fashion shows from 1990-2001; and French model Dominique de la Viola, who a

Saint Laurent was the first living fashion designer to be honoured by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1983 with a solo exhibition. By French President Jacques Chirac in 2001, he was given the rank of Commander of the Légion d'Honneur. Saint Laurent retired in 2002 and became more conservative. In 2007, French President Nicolas Sarkozy named him Grand officier de la Légion d'honneur. He also founded a foundation in Paris with Bergé to trace the YSL's past, which includes 15,000 objects and 5,000 pieces of clothing.

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Personal life and career

Saint Laurent submitted three sketches to a competition for young fashion designers organized by the International Wool Secretariat in 1953. Saint Laurent took first place. He was invited to attend the awards ceremony in Paris in December of the same year.

During his stay in Paris, Saint Laurent met Michel de Brunhoff, then editor-in-chief of the French version of Vogue magazine, as well as a connection to his father. De Brunhoff, who was seen by some as a compassionate person who aided new talent, was captivated by Saint Laurent's sketches, which revealed that he might like to become a fashion designer. Saint Laurent's later decided to enroll in a programme at the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture, the body that controls the haute couture trade and provides education to its employees. Saint Laurent took his advice and moved from Oran to Paris after graduation, completing his studies as a star pupil. He entered the International Wool Secretariat competition again this year and took the title, beating out Fernando Sánchez and young German student Karl Lagerfeld.

He drew a series of sketches to de Brunhoff, who noticed close resemblance to sketches drawn that morning by Christian Dior. De Brunhoff, who knew that Dior had designed the sketches but that the young man may not have seen them, sent him to Dior, who hired him on the spot.

Despite Dior's immediate recognition, Saint Laurent's first year at the House of Dior spent his first year in the House of Dior on mundane tasks, such as painting the studio and designing accessories. He was eventually allowed to submit sketches for the couture collection. More of his sketches were accepted by Dior with each passing season. Dior began working with Saint Laurent's mother in August 1957 to inform her that he had chosen Saint Laurent to replace him as a designer. His mother later said that she had been confused by the remark because Dior was only 52 years old at the time. Both she and her son were surprised when Dior died at a health spa in northern Italy from a major heart attack in October 1957.

Saint Laurent, the House of Dior's chief designer, discovered himself at the age of 21 in 1957. His spring 1958 collection almost certainly saved the company from financial ruin. His first collection for Dior, called the Trapeze line, which is a spin on Dior's 1955 A-Line, catapulted him to international success. The collection's dresses came with a narrow shoulder that flexed delicately to a hem that barely covered the knee.

His fall 1958 collection was not welcomed with the same degree of approval as his first and later collections for the House of Dior, which included hobble skirts and beatnik fashions, were not welcomed by the public.

Farah Diba, a Paris undergraduate, was chosen by Farah Diba to style her wedding dress for her marriage to the Shah of Iran in 1959.

During the Algerian War of Independence, Saint Laurent was ordered to serve in the French Army in 1960. After the disastrous 1958 season, Neri Karra writes that there was rumors that Marcel Boussac, the proprietor of the House of Dior and a powerful press baron, had pressed the government not to conscript Saint Laurent in 1958 and 1959, but the government changed direction and ordered that the designer be conscripted so that he could be replaced.

Saint Laurent was in the military for 20 days before being admitted to a military hospital, where he learned he had been discharged from Dior. His condition exacerbated, and he was rushed to Val-de-Grâce military hospital, where he was given large doses of sedatives and psychoactive drugs and was exposed to electroshock therapy. To this point in hospital, Saint Laurent himself traced both his mental and heroin use.

Saint Laurent filed a lawsuit against Dior for breach of contract and won. After a period of convalescence, he and his partner, industrialist Pierre Bergé, founded Yves Saint Laurent YSL with funds from American millionaire J. Mack Robinson. In 1976, the couple wept romantically, but they remained business partners.

The firm pioneered fashion trends in the 1960s and 1970s, including the beatnik look, tight trousers, high-top boots, and Le Smoking, which was arguably the most popular tuxedo suit for women, especially after witnessing the epochal French uprisings of the year. The wearing of silhouettes has also become a staple at Saint Laurent. and is credited with initiating the broad, shoulder-padded styles that would define the 1980s in 1978.

In the 1960s and the 1970s, Yves Saint Laurent brought about new fashion reforms to the fashion industry. Rive Gauche, the French designer, opened his Pret-a-Porter House in 1967, where he began to shift his attention away from Haute Couture to Ready-to-wear. One of the objectives was to offer a wider variety of trendy styles to choose from in the market because they were both inexpensive and inexpensive.

He was the first French couturier to debut a complete prêt-à-porter (ready-to-wear) collection, although Alicia Drake cites Saint Laurent's desire to democratize fashion; others point out that other couture houses were preparing prêt-à-porter lines simultaneously – the House of Yves Saint Laurent announced their lines first. On the 26th arrondissement of Paris, the first of the company's Rive Gauche stores, which sold the prêt-à-porter brand, opened on the rue de Tournon. Catherine Deneuve was the first client. In films including Heartbeat, Mississippi Mermaid, and Love to Eternity, he continued to do many costumes for her.

Both his followers and the press loved many of his collections, including the fall 1965 edition, which included a Le Smoking tailored tuxedo suit and his 1965 Mondrian collection. Other collections, such as his spring 1971 collection, which was inspired by 1940s fashion, caused controversy. Some adored the German occupation of France during World War II, which he did not experience, while others believed it brought back the time's unattractive utilitarianism. The spring 1971 edition of France Soir was titled "Une grande farce!" Despite this collection, however, he rose to be considered the world's most influential designer during the 1970s, adapting his designs to modern women's needs. The clothes themselves remained comfortable and wearable even in his sometimes lavish Russian peasant collections of the middle of the decade.

Saint Laurent was regarded as one of Paris's "jet set" in the 1960s and 1970s. He was often seen in French and New York City clubs, such as Regine's and Studio 54, as both a heavy drinker and a frequent cocaine user. When he wasn't actively overseeing the preparation of a collection, he spent time at his villa in Marrakech, Morocco. He and Bergé acquired Château Gabriel in Benerville-sur-Mer, France, in the late 1970s. Yves Saint Laurent was a devoted promoter of Marcel Proust, who had been a frequent visitor of Gaston Gallimard, one of the villa's previous owners. When they purchased Château Gabriel, Saint Laurent and Bergé commissioned Jacques Grange to decorate it with Proust's Remembrance of Things Past.

If not with the critics, the prêt-à-porter line became extremely popular with the public, and Saint Laurent and Bergé's luxe couture line earned more money than the haute couture line. However, Saint Laurent, whose health had been precarious for years, became erratic under the pressure of launching two haute couture and two prêt-à-porter collections each year. He gradually reverted to alcohol and opioids. At certain shows, he could barely walk down the runway at the end of the performance, and models had to be accompanied.

Following his 1978 introduction of big-shouldered jackets, narrow skirts, and pumps that didn't change much during the decade, several fashion journalists were left bemoaning the loss of his former creativity and others applauding the familiarity. He handed over the responsibility of the prêt-à-porter line to his assistants following a horrific 1987 prêt-à-porter show in New York City, which featured US$100,000 jeweled casual jackets only days after the "Black Monday" stock market crash. Despite the fact that the line remained popular with his followers, it was soon dismissed by the media as "boring."

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