Style & beauty - July 2008

The king of fashion

In 1957, at the age of 21, a young male designer was named head of the most prestigious couture house in France.

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The designer was Yves Saint Laurent and with his sad passing on 2nd June 2008 at the age of 71 his death has been aptly described as "leaving a great emptiness but also a sublime inheritance".

Yves Saint Laurent born on 1st August 1936 in Oran, Algeria, and was to become one of the most revered and influential fashion designers of the 20th century. He left a legacy of directional and modern designs that leave a lasting influence on fashion design today.

Saint Laurent's fashion career started early and his rise was swift. In 1953, when Saint Laurent was 17 he won first prize for a cocktail dress design in a contest sponsored by the International Wool Secretariat. After only 3 months studying design at the prestigious Chambre Syndicale School of haute couture, Saint Laurent 'dropped out' and was subsequently introduced to Christian Dior who, after seeing his designs, hired him on the spot to work for the house of Dior.

In 1957, just four years later at the age of 21, he was made head of the fashion house after the sudden death of Dior and his subsequent collections (including the highly successful trapeze collection) were received with acclaim.

Depression and mental health plagued him from early in his life, and shortly after his appointment at Dior he was conscripted into the French army. After serving only 1 month he was institutionalised in a French mental hospital for a nervous breakdown (some say brought on by the harsh treatment of his fellow officers).

In 1962, after he was released from Dior and with funding from an American millionaire, he and lover Pierre Bergé started their own fashion house that would change the face of fashion.

His revolutionary designs including his legendary 'le smoking' (tuxedo) suit in 1966, the beatnik look, safari suits for men and women, and see-through blouses gave women a sense of empowerment and a new way to dress. He also combined his love of art with fashion design and brilliantly referenced works from his favourite artists throughout his career.

Saint Laurent introduced masculine tailoring for women and sleek pantsuits and high boots showed that "men's clothes" could be elegant and feminine on the female form. Fashion folklore suggests that this revolutionary style of dressing for women was not always well received and it is reported that many fashionistas wearing his pants suits were denied entrance into smart hotels and restaurants.

In 1966, Saint Laurent's vision of bringing luxury fashion to the general population was born with the launch of the first ready-to-wear collection and opened a boutique, Rive Gauche, in Paris' sixth arrondissment.

The one undisputed fact amongst Saint Laurent's fans and critics was that he was a master of tailoring and cut and his ability to produce garments of superb cut coupled with his bold use of colour and luxurious fabric stood him apart from many designers throughout his career.

Saint Laurent's life was full of 'firsts' - he was the first designer to use black models in his runway shows, the first couturier to dress women in see-through fabric, the first couturier to set up a private collection of his work, the first designer to show his haute couture show live on the internet in 1996 and the first living designer to be honoured by the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Saint Laurent also liked to shock and made headlines in 1971 with a media campaign for his YSL perfume featuring Monsieur Laurent in the nude and then later in 1977 with the launch of his Opium perfume (which lead to charges that he was glamorising drug use).

Saint Laurent muses included Catherine Deneuve, Loulou de la Falaise, Betty Catroux, Talitha Pol-Getty, and Laetitia Casta. Miss Deneuve was by his side at his final couture show in 2002.

On 12 July 1998 at the final of the World Cup at the Grand Stade de France in Saint-Denis, near Paris, 300 models presented a retrospective of 40 years of Monsieur Laurent's creations in front of 80,000 spectators and viewed by more than 170 TV channels from all over the world.

The YSL empire successfully continued until 2002 when the doors of the couture house were closed and Saint Laurent retired. In the years prior to his death it was visibly apparent that Saint Laurent's health was declining and speculation about the state of his mental health was rife. Publicly it was stated by his business partner Pierre Bergé that Saint Laurent retired as he felt that the fashion world "didn't understand him".

It was not until after his retirement that Saint Laurent himself finally spoke publicly about his battle with depression and drugs and sense of eternal loneliness.

Saint Laurent stayed out of the fashion limelight until his death in his apartment in Paris from the effects of brain cancer.

800 mourners attended his funeral in Paris on 6 June 2008 including his 95 year old mother, the fashion elite and celebrities. Most of the women who attended the funeral mass were dressed in trouser suits as a tribute to the man who was the first designer to dress women in pants. A crowd of hundreds of people applauded his coffin as it was taken into the Saint Roch church

Saint Laurent's body was cremated, and his ashes were scattered in Marrakech, Morocco in a garden that he often visited to seek refuge from his troubled mind.

"Fashion is not only supposed to make women beautiful, but to reassure them, to give the confidence, to allow them to come to terms with themselves", Yves Saint Laurent.

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Esma Versace Styling and Events p 0417 442 616 e versacestyle@ozemail.com.au