Hedi Slimane - Designer

[george5]

And you both Spike413 and dior_couture1245 got it right. All the Rive Gauche thing was about the moment, the context and what was going on in the streets those times. No formalism, no contrived conceptualism and such. That's why I think Slimane is doing it right because He used the same formula that Yves created: Hedi took different urban subcultures movements, contextualized them in his indie-rock scene and expressed it through Yves archive and heritage. As simple as that.

 

[GivenchyAddict]

Good article from the Cut after the one by Alexander Fury, here : http://nymag.com/thecut/2015/08/why-hedi-slimane-isnt-dishonoring-ysl.html

 

[Phuel]

I think this is something no one in the Fashion Spot or fashion in general can do: loving a designer and being critical with him.

You must be joking, Creative. Just have a gander at Lola's post right above yours and it's clear she's critical in her admiration of him.

I'm definitely critical of my favs-- from Dries to Rei to Thom Browne. And Hedi's chosen style of design; His designer versions of the couture-y Peruvian pullover hoodie, macrame ponchos, Peter Pan-collar baby-dolls and Docs are utterly silly to me. But, there amongst these silly pieces, there are always some really amazing separates that will stand the test of time, and I also admire how devoted he is to this musical youth subculture that's quickly come to define his vision of Saint Laurent. And, it's just that: He's adding to the legacy of a label-- I don't see where the disrespect, the dishonoring some have accused him of towards Yves legacy. It just feels more genuine to me than some designers' occasional fling with the music scene as a concept or theme that only touches upon the cliches and caricatures, only to dump it for something else the next season.

You know, whenever people casually dismiss Hedi's offering as just expensive TopShop trope, then I feel there's really no point to continue discussing further with them. I mean, I can easily just say why bother with Nina Ricci's $23,000+ basic fox jacket when one can get a much much much cheaper version-- faux-fur, or real at any given time. So for Alex-- whom I've always considered on the rather interesting, and even clever side of fashion journalism, brings up that tired "it's so TopShop", it sort of diminishes his argument just a little bit, because, he does know Hedi's designs aren't TopShop offerings-- but hey, it sure gets those rallying pitchforks up quickly, doesn't it?

 

[bbofbalenciaga]

You know, whenever people casually dismiss Hedi's offering as just expensive TopShop trope, then I feel there's really no point to continue discussing further with them. I mean, I can easily just say why bother with Nina Ricci's $23,000+ basic fox jacket when one can get a much much much cheaper version-- faux-fur, or real at any given time. So for Alex-- whom I've always considered on the rather interesting, and even clever side of fashion journalism, brings up that tired "it's so TopShop", it sort of diminishes his argument just a little bit, because, he does know Hedi's designs aren't TopShop offerings-- but hey, it sure gets those rallying pitchforks up quickly, doesn't it?

I dont think anybody is comparing saint Laurent vs topshop quality wise, thats ridiculous, its obvious all the amount of work and care that goes behind a Saint Laurent garment.

If you look at Alessandro´s Gucci, which is ALL pure basics with the same design level (none) as a Saint laurent show, nobody complaints or acusses Alessandro from compying mass market, and thats the difference and (to me) why Sain Laurent is comparable to all this fast fashion brands (what is anything but current).

 

[RedSmokeRise]

I find it funny that a lot of critics want some kind of grand sociopolitical commentary from their clothes these days.

I love Hedi's clothes but I'm also fully aware that they're just really great clothes. His approach to fashion is actually a breath of fresh air in the context of all this forced intellectualism designers keep trying to shove down our throats.

 

[Phuel]

^^^ I always get it's more a case of fashion-victim-itis than anything else, to be frank. Seems like some just have to have the latest and newest in high fashion, regardless of how it may look on them: I think the term "ground-breaking" is a favorite that's thrown around this forum a lot when it comes to some's expectations from designers.

You know, there's always the reliable "looks just like Top Shop!" snickerings when it applies to Hedi's newest SLP collection from some on TFS: Like Marvin Gaye's Trouble Man line "There's only three things for sure: Taxes, death and trouble"-- I'd add a fourth thing: "Hedi's SLP looks just like Top Shop!" posts on this forum LOL

 

[Spike413]

I find it funny that a lot of critics want some kind of grand sociopolitical commentary from their clothes these days.

I love Hedi's clothes but I'm also fully aware that they're just really great clothes. His approach to fashion is actually a breath of fresh air in the context of all this forced intellectualism designers keep trying to shove down our throats.

I'll second this.

Even when I've been either totally annoyed by or even left mostly indifferent to Hedi's collections for Saint Laurent (the grunge one comes to mind) I will admit that there's something refreshing about how un-pretentious it is. That's not to say I don't love conceptual stuff, I absolutely do, but these days conceptual has become the rule, rather than the exception, and to be utterly frank the vast majority of designers simply aren't cut out for designing conceptual fashion. It's after I force myself to look at some of those collections that I really come to appreciate a collection that isn't desperately striving to be more than it is, that's fully comfortable being about well crafted clothing that's very transparently been designed to create a certain mood rather than a dissertation about its subtext. Michael Kors gets this, Dries Van Noten gets this, Marc Jacobs (when he's "on"), Alber Elbaz, Peter Copping and Tom Ford each get this, and I think it's entirely fair to say that Hedi Slimane does as well.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that in 2015 its actually braver to take that approach to designing than it is to overload a collection with meaning and symbolism and concept. But ultimately there should be allowed to be a balance in the industry, a mixture of fashion that's cerebral with fashion that's sensual. Trying to shame certain designers into conforming to one approach to doing it or the other just seems asinine.

 

[jescajade]

Looks like someone's been holding a bit of a grudge, while I enjoy Fury's writing I agree Fury's arguments seem irrelevant like they're 3 years too late, it's like what Cathy Horyn was saying at the time, but even she has accepted that Hedi Slimane is capturing the current mood of fashion at Saint Laurent. Still, there are many journalists who can't stand the fact that he just doesn't give **** about them. Saying "Slimane's Saint Laurent "appeals to the lowest common denominator” is a bit of a low dig, (didn't Yves say down with the Ritz) especially when he's saying the Saint Laurent Couture is going to be 'excluding', I mean what else is Couture?
I also don't get how the aesthetic Hedi has honed at Saint Laurent is different from his days at Dior Homme, both are/were about the clothes, the styling, and the whole attitude that surrounds them. If you go back to Slimane's Dior Homme days you'll see that what he's doing at Saint Laurent is almost the same, the culture, music, silhouettes etc. from season to season the overall look was pretty similar and consistent, he just refined and refined the look.
Saying the "house has been ripped apart, quietly gutted" doesn't ring true either, everything Slimane has done at Saint Laurent has been in homage to Yves, from the name change to the pieces on the runway, you can even usually play spot the reference with the collections, you can see his admiration for Yves and his legacy. I think bringing back Couture is another point, I think Hedi is trying to recreate the house in Yves Saint Laurent's image, and having Couture fits into that.
Sure Hedi is not exactly doing anything 'new', but I can count on one hand the designers that actually innovating and bringing something new to fashion every season.

 

[Kite]

I agree with Fury. Saint Laurent is a mess. The women look like victims, not powerful. Yves's women always looked like she was in charge. There is no romance. There is no passion. Its a laddered tight and an exposed breast. Its not a grudge, they just released news of the Couture line and the new Maison, So I don't see why people are saying its 'Old News' when Fury is mainly talking about both those things.

Yves shocked critics in a world where being shocked was newsworthy, pushing a boundary in a world that was smaller and less exposed. The only exposure Hedi can muster is a one shoulder dress with a breast reveal and Day old hair and makeup.

His clothes are saleable. They are very easily shoppable and made well enough. They are also EXTORTIONATELY priced (Those sequin tights mentioned earlier were over EUR2000). There just is no love in his clothes. Yves loved fashion, design and women. Heidi makes them look like they slept in the street and scraping together enough money for Yeast Infection treatment.

Also, Fury is not saying that Couture is not exclusive. Couture is available to the extremely wealthy. What he is saying is its actually excluding people who can afford it. If a customer wanted to, and had, $100,000 to spend on a Couture Coat, they would find a way to make it happen.

Hedi is creating lacklustre designs for astronomical prices, and telling willing customers they're not 'Cool enough' to wear them. Thats Exclusion, not exclusive.

Alber has been designing 'Just clothes' for years, so had Dries. But they always look to see where their women are going, what they are doing. Heidi's women has been standing on the street corner since his second collection and its time she, and him both realised thats not the 'Mood of today'....

 

[Chanelcouture09]

**Edited**

I think his points are a little late in the day to be expressing since this is on a similar note to what Cathy Horyn wrote shortly after he was appointed.

 

[Spike413]

I agree with Fury. Saint Laurent is a mess. The women look like victims, not powerful. Yves's women always looked like she was in charge. There is no romance. There is no passion. Its a laddered tight and an exposed breast. Its not a grudge, they just released news of the Couture line and the new Maison, So I don't see why people are saying its 'Old News' when Fury is mainly talking about both those things.

Yves shocked critics in a world where being shocked was newsworthy, pushing a boundary in a world that was smaller and less exposed. The only exposure Hedi can muster is a one shoulder dress with a breast reveal and Day old hair and makeup.

His clothes are saleable. They are very easily shoppable and made well enough. They are also EXTORTIONATELY priced (Those sequin tights mentioned earlier were over EUR2000). There just is no love in his clothes. Yves loved fashion, design and women. Heidi makes them look like they slept in the street and scraping together enough money for Yeast Infection treatment.

Also, Fury is not saying that Couture is not exclusive. Couture is available to the extremely wealthy. What he is saying is its actually excluding people who can afford it. If a customer wanted to, and had, $100,000 to spend on a Couture Coat, they would find a way to make it happen.

Hedi is creating lacklustre designs for astronomical prices, and telling willing customers they're not 'Cool enough' to wear them. Thats Exclusion, not exclusive.

Alber has been designing 'Just clothes' for years, so had Dries. But they always look to see where their women are going, what they are doing. Heidi's women has been standing on the street corner since his second collection and its time she, and him both realised thats not the 'Mood of today'....

And how is that really any different than, say, what Alessandro Michele has been doing with Gucci's menswear? Or what a good many designers do when they create clothing that is only affordable, flattering and suited to a specific selection of people?

That's the s*** side of fashion, and for anyone -- least of all Fury who is well versed in the inner workings of the industry, not to mention clever -- to think or pretend otherwise is laughable. The only difference here is that Slimane and Saint Laurent are being open about it.

Further, the argument of whether or not shredded stockings and purposefully exposed breasts makes a woman look like a victim depends entirely on the mind of the viewer. Helplessness and victimization to one can read as rebellion and a lack of care for social mores to another.

 

[dior_couture1245]

I guess what I'm also getting the feeling of is a kind of resistance and unwillingness to accept change within fashion by some - particularly with Fury's pouty article. This is Saint Laurent now. I'm learning to see the positives in it and am beginning to find a lot of what Hedi is doing is really, really relevant and extremely on the pulse...and it's really interesting to see how many feathers he is ruffling by simply making well made, attractive CLOTHES. It's really challenging what fashion has been all about for the last 5 years or so.

These houses have to keep moving forward and changing in order to stay relevant and important. They are not relics. I'm certainly guilty of disliking change at certain houses - Dior, in particular - but it's only because I continue to find what Raf does for Dior so out of touch with the way women are really dressing today. It's almost as if Hedi's work for Saint Laurent has created such a contrast to the work of Raf at Dior...Hedi's straight forward, well made clothing makes Raf's overworked, awkward experiments look truly ridiculous and out of touch. It's that formalism that Hedi spoke about that really is so outdated at this point.

 

[george5]

Pierre Bergé talks Hedi Slimane and Yves Saint Laurent

12th Sep 2015
by Suzy Menkes

Even before Pierre Bergé started our conversation, I could hear his dog barking. No, not another “Moujik", the name that his partner Yves Saint Laurent gave to all their dogs. This one is Echo, white and fluffy and the constant companion of the 84-year-old aesthete and éminence grise of the fashion world. Explosive, opinionated and rambunctious - especially about the state of couture and designers' attempts to ape Yves - Bergé led me to ask one big question...

What did he think about Hedi Slimane's dissection of his role at Saint Laurent?

The "question-and-answer" online interview with Hedi was the fashion chatterbox of the summer. Uploaded during the dog days of August on the Yahoo Style website, little followed by fashion insiders, the interview was a precise dissection of the mind and policy of Slimane, 47. The intelligent questions by Dirk Standen, the former editor-in-chief of style.com, were not co-responsive. This “conversation" was handled via email.

Yet Slimane's replies, didactic and informative, laid out with clinical precision how the designer envisages his role at Saint Laurent, including a step towards a modernised couture, with made-to-order tailoring in a new hôtel particulier on the Left Bank, the heartland of Yves, who passed away in 2008.

Almost every fashionista seems to have an opinion about Hedi's words, which I found fascinating because it was not an interview as I, as a journalist, understand the term. Rather than a conversation, in which a journalist poses questions and hopes for an interesting answer, this was more a strategy laid out bare in intense detail. In fact, in a private conversation with François-Henri Pinault, CEO of the Kering Group which owns Saint Laurent, the executive told me how fascinated and excited he was by Slimane's dissection of brand strategy and that he had sent the Yahoo words throughout his entire company.

But Bergé's reaction had to be different. He had an emotional attachment to Yves Saint Laurent, the man, and to Hedi, whom Bergé had originally talent-spotted for YSL menswear and avidly followed his subsequent career at Dior Homme. After that, the sensitive Slimane had left fashion for photography, working out of Berlin. But Bergé had found a place to show Hedi's striking work in the musical underground at the Fondation Pierre Bergé-Yves Saint Laurent in Paris.

This father/son relationship was passionately represented in Hedi's online declaration of "unconditional love" and gratitude. "It is difficult to express how much I love him and admire him – I would do anything for him" were Hedi's words. I was eager to ask Bergé about that - and other elements of the online conversation in which he had no part.

Here is our discussion, slightly trimmed, and translated by me from its original French.

PIERRE BERGÉ IN CONVERSATION WITH SUZY MENKES

SUZY: Pierre. I wanted to talk because I read with great interest the long interview online with Hedi, which I found powerful - and fascinating.

BERGÉ: Me, too!

SUZY: I want to have your opinion about Hedi. There are so many bad things said about him, such as that he isn't really at Yves Saint Laurent's level. But I would like to hear what you think. You were behind Hedi from the start, weren't you?

BERGÉ: I am going to reply to you very precisely, Suzy. Firstly, I always accepted, because I couldn't do otherwise, that Yves Saint Laurent had to have a successor. It would be completely idiotic to think otherwise. That's one thing.

Secondly, to imagine that this successor would copy and re-make Saint Laurent until the end of time is equally idiotic. A successor to replace Saint Laurent must have his own vision and talent.

There have been two successors: Tom Ford and (Stefano) Pilati. I would like to say precisely that I recognise a lot of talent from Tom Ford – but it is for marketing. And that he had, in effect, redone the Gucci brand in a spectacular fashion, and I have a lot of admiration for that. I will say to you again, “admiration". But he was incapable of succeeding Yves Saint Laurent. Therefore it was, as you know, a flop. As for Pilati, it is better not to talk about it because it was nothing at all.

Then came Hedi. You can like it or not. Personally, I don't like all of it. But Hedi is someone who has a huge talent - that is indisputable. He has a real vision. You have to accept that, with its qualities and faults. That is what I think. I like him very much, I like Hedi a lot - a lot.

SUZY: I must say that in the big interview, Hedi says that he loves you.

BERGÉ: I read the interview and I was very touched and even flattered. But at the same time I was very embarrassed because it was such a big declaration. But I understand, because Hedi has always said it, since the early days, that he accepted to come to Saint Laurent and to come back "for Yves and for you". Only that. There was no other reason.

SUZY: In your opinion, why are people so dramatic when they talk about Hedi?

BERGÉ: There is a good reason. The truth is that Hedi does not really like people. He doesn't like journalists much. He doesn't play the rules of the game with the press. Therefore, people don't like him.

SUZY: Surely it goes further than that? It's also connected with Saint Laurent. There is a very good young British journalist [Alexander Fury] who wrote a piece recently in which he claimed that Hedi is not at the level of Saint Laurent – and it had to be said.

BERGÉ: I can understand all that, but we must be honest. I want to ask you frankly: is there anyone you think who is at the level of Saint Laurent? I'm asking you the question. I don't know a single person who is at Saint Laurent's level.

SUZY: I find it interesting what Hedi is doing at the moment and the new image he is giving to couture. He may do things which correspond more with menswear, because I thought he did very good things at Dior Homme and I wonder if he will follow that path for his couture? But I admit that it is not the same as Saint Laurent, who made all sorts of clothes.

BERGÉ: I am speaking to you in all honesty. It is not because I lived with Saint Laurent for 50 years that I have become hesitant. For me, Saint Laurent was much more than a couturier – it went further than that. Saint Laurent caused a revolution, a transformation which penetrated society, which left the aesthetic heights where all the other couturiers could be found and entered the social territory. He invented, really invented, as you know, ready-to-wear – and what followed is there.

This collection that we showed with such enormous success [at the Fondation] was the scandalous show of 1971. It was an extraordinary vision of the future. It went far beyond the status of a couturier. When people say that Slimane is not at the level of Saint Laurent… Yes, perhaps. Probably. But I don't know a single person at Yves Saint Laurent's level. And for various reasons – you know the business as much as I do – it no longer exists.

SUZY: Well, everything has changed. Now there is a lot of marketing. Designers have to make 10 collections a year. That is a killer.

BERGÉ: There is another thing I want to share with you - that Yves had one absolute and infallible rule. On the stage or on the runway, everything he showed was for sale. And in the boutiques, everything for sale had been shown on the runway. There were never any parallel collections. There were no clothes made to be photographed and other clothes made for clients.

SUZY: Something that I notice now - and it is quite bizarre - is that people have become hysterical about designers. Was it always like that?

BERGÉ: No, it was not always like that, it became like that. I am not in a good position to talk about it, because I was the one who created the first ready-to-wear syndicate in 1973. I found Karl Lagerfeld, Sonia Rykiel, Kenzo, Emmanuelle Khanh and Dorothée Bis – then on the other side five big couturiers out of 10. We were 10 showing prêt-à-porter collections, and that was all. But you see what it has turned into: 180 to 200. It's gone crazy. And there is this myth of the designer, who is now made into a movie star.

SUZY: But weren't they already considered as stars? Yves was, in a way, the star of his epoch.

BERGÉ: Yes, in a certain way. But not how it is now.

SUZY: There wasn't the love for, and culture of, celebrity as we see it now.

BERGÉ: It's ridiculous. Ridiculous!

SUZY: When we hear all these stories around Hedi, isn't it true, Pierre, that people are looking less at the clothes and more about what is happening around the collections?

BERGÉ: As you know, I created and I am still president of the Institut Français de la Mode (IFN). You know what was the focus? Teaching. You must understand that this no longer exists – it's a different subject. Haute couture is not art but an applied art, and thus had disappeared. Today, as I see it, the only way to do fashion now – and I must add that I don't know the owners nor the designers of these houses, and I don't have any financial involvement with them – fashion today is Zara and H&M. I'm not saying it is good, but I profoundly believe this.

SUZY: But that is something else again - and it is all about marketing.

BERGÉ: I know it is about marketing. But it is the quality in relation to the price that is so powerful. Fashion and couture today serve who? The nouveau riches.

SUZY: I want to ask you something. I wrote an article ages ago when I said that Karl played Salieri to the Mozart of Saint Laurent. Do you think that is true?

BERGÉ: Karl's problem is the following: it's like two starlets in the theatre or cinema, when one becomes Marilyn Monroe and the other is a nobody. I like Karl a lot - I've known him for ever. He is really cultivated and very intelligent. But Karl's big problem is that he has never been successful with his own label. And he has not been able to reach the same level of success as under the name of Chanel. It is sad.

SUZY: Returning to Hedi – do you see him a lot? When I saw him in Los Angeles, he was in good spirits. He seemed completely different than in Paris. In LA he looked great and seemed on top form. Do you see him often?

BERGÉ: No, because he usually comes to Paris for just a few days. I see him each time he comes to Paris, but for a short time. I keep promising to go to Los Angeles to spend a few days with him, and I will do it one day.

vogue.com.au

 

[dodencebt]

^ Yikes, brutal. I personally disagree with what he has to say about Tom Ford's stint at Yves Saint Laurent and its success, though.

 

[Marc10]

As for Pilati, it is better not to talk about it because it was nothing at all.

Damn

 

[Creative]

As for Pilati, it is better not to talk about it because it was nothing at all.

I die.


Anyway, I love, love, love Bergé; but he sounds like a very old, grumpy man.

And what he said about KL is just... bullsh!t.

 

[Phuel]

...I want to ask you frankly: is there anyone you think who is at the level of Saint Laurent? I'm asking you the question. I don't know a single person who is at Saint Laurent's level.

My God... Yves Saint Laurent has his place in fashion history that's for certain. But to say that not a single person is at his level...? Are you f*cking kidding me...? That's so beyond even hyperbole on Berge's part. Gaultier, Galliano, McQueen, Tom Ford, Armani, Miuccia have all impacted fashion beyond what Yves was able to do. And those are just the individuals that I'm speaking of objectively and from a commercial perspective whom have become names that are recognized beyond high fashion fans. And for me, Hedi is so much more talented than Yves ever was.

 

[Lola701]

I mean, a basic childish interview of Pierre Bergé...

I've always loved his ability to re-write fashion history. He said he found Karl Lagerfeld. NO COMMENT!

I remember him 20 years ago saying that Claude Montana was the real successor of YSL. Then, he was very supportive of Jean Paul Gaultier, inviting him at YSL couture shows and he even went to his shows. Then he loved Alber Elbaz's work for Guy Laroche so much that he hired him at YSL. Today, he doesn't even mention him as one of his successor.
Then, he started to praise Tom Ford's work for Gucci, saying that he designed for women first and that he was very talented. Tom was invited to YSL couture shows and Bergé was all over french tv with Mr Pinault praising his work and the fact that he was coming to YSL.
We all know what happened as he stopped coming to Tom shows after his first 2 seasons.

Today, Stefano Pilati that he loved so much from 2005 to 2008 (after that, Riccardo was the best for him) is persona-non-grata?

I'll have to disagree also on the success of Tom Ford at YSL. Yves stopped the rtw in the early 90's and i remember the brand selling umbrellas and cigarettes to survive, under Pierre Bergé's tenure.

Every designer who came at YSL helped the brand the become the fashion force it was in the 70's. I find his comments very unfair.

As for Karl, i really don't understand the comparison. It was known that Yves was jealous when Karl got the job at Chanel and was successful at it.

With all the respect that i have for mr Saint Laurent, can we stop pretending that he invented RTW? He started RTW to speak to a younger audience but also because one fashion house became really successful. That fashion was created in the Left Bank, the audience that Yves wanted to reach. And that brand was...Chloé, designed by his friend Karl.

 

[RedSmokeRise]

That comment about Stefano Pilati was way harsh

 

[george5]

That comment about Stefano Pilati was way harsh

I think It's spot on