February 25, 2007
Past Present
Glamour, Mon Amour
Don Ashby, left; Richard Kalvar/Magnum photo
Rich satin at Prada, left; vintage Saint Laurent jewel tones.
By SUZY MENKES
The soundtrack was not the Beatles telling us, “All you need is love.” But that seemed to be the message from the sweet maidens in gauzy layers toting bags filled with wildflowers. On those totes, at the Louis Vuitton show, were the elegant, elongated letters spelling out “LOVE.” Now, where have I seen that before?
It didn’t take much fashion I.Q. to realize that Vuitton’s designer,
Marc Jacobs, had “appropriated” Yves Saint Laurent’s symbol of the 1970s — the same one that Saint Laurent had used annually for his end-of-year greetings. Just add an “o” and an “e” to the LV logo, and voilà!
Since Jacobs is a past master at downloading sound bites of fashion history and shuffling them as if on an iPod, this foray into the YSL archives might have warranted only a shrug. But this was not the only reference to the Saint Laurent oeuvre this spring. The ideas kept popping up — and from cutting-edge designers. Five years after the iconic couturier retired, it seems that the fashion world is still mad about Yves.
The most outright homage was from Miuccia Prada, whose Africa-meets-1940s collection of ethnic prints as well as tunics and turbans paid obeisance to some of Saint Laurent’s most famous pieces. It may be hard to find a black model on the runway these days — even if it was YSL who kicked off that multiethnic attitude — but after a decade of ignoring tribal folklore, at least that trend is finally making a comeback.
Prada herself has been a YSL aficionado since her university days, when his vision suited her Marxist ideology and her debating appearances. Whereas the square shoulders of the 1940s were last seen in the YSL pantsuit (famously known as the power suit) throughout the 1980s, they came from a complex inspiration, as the young Saint Laurent recreated the vision of his adored mother in the war years. The French, still raw over defeat and collaboration, rejected the short, square, turban-topped silhouette that Saint Laurent first sent out for summer 1971; there may be more takers for Prada’s version, a vivid duchesse-satin tunic. Especially if it’s worn with a skirt, instead of the underpants it was shown with on the runway.
In her Miu Miu line, Prada proved that if you mix the 1940s with Africana, you get a striking take on a print; her dresses managed to look both graphic and tribal. Now, sophisticated tribal arts may sound like an oxymoron, this despite Picasso’s infatuation with African art and the French love affair with
Josephine Baker in the 1920s. But it took Saint Laurent, who was born in North Africa, to embrace tribalism in haute couture. His linear patterns and fantastic neck pieces produced a culture shock in 1967, when Paris was already stirring with a youth revolution.
Did Riccardo Tisci, who was not even born in 1967, give a backward glance to YSL when he created his latest collection for Givenchy?
The African patterns, played out in black and cream, with striped hose and patterned shoes, all had a multiethnic feel. Similarly, at Lanvin, Alber Elbaz, who himself had a brief stint at YSL, blended ethnicity and futurism in a delicate mix. He incorporated the look of tribal neck pieces into his shiny dresses and then furthered the idea with breastplate pendants, disk jewelry and giant hoop earrings. Elbaz, at least, had the courage to show some of these creations on African models.
Nobody knows how it is that individual designers can reach into their personal wellspring of creativity and yet come out with exactly what the next guy is doing. It’s what the French call capturing l’air du temps, or what we think of as the fashion vibe. You could read the fashion tea leaves and see the African influence as a reflection of escalating tribal warfare. On the other hand, maybe it’s as simple as a couple of designers flicking through the archives of the 20th century and alighting on the same source. As that Louis Vuitton tote bag might have said: we love YSL.
AP photo, left; Don Ashby
Tribal futurism at Lanvin, right; Saint Laurent’s African-style dress from 1967.
Don Ashby; Alain Dejean/Sygma/Corbis
Love, Louis Vuitton style, left; Saint Laurent’s nonconformist wedding dress from 1970.
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great effort.
