Were you surprised at how negatively some critics reacted to your first collection and indeed continue to react?
I completely understand the reactions. There was a particular context, like someone switching off the music at a birthday party, but I knew my project would be sensitive.
Going back to design was a significant and difficult decision. I had found a balance with my life in California for many years, a certain serenity and joy.
I was in a peaceful place, and this new design project meant I certainly would have to expose myself more than I would normally want to. I was thrilled to go back to a fashion studio, let alone to a house that felt like family.
However, really early on, my project was surrounded by heavy politics and conflicts of interests. It all started before my first show, out of endless speculations. The tone was set no matter what I would design the first season.
I needed to keep a distance with all the outside commotion that felt unrelated to me and my intentions for the house. The discussions about the name change was, for instance, were misleading and oblivious to the history of Saint Laurent Rive Gauche.
I just wanted to focus on the future of the House with dedication and determination, and hold on to the project I had conceived for it.
The question for me was never criticism, but rather personal considerations and agendas. This is a completely different subject. Everyone was entitled to their opinions and uproar if there were no ulterior or personal motives. I knew my project was not going to be consensual in any way. Consensual at Yves Saint Laurent would probably make no sense.
Some of the reactions were probably in response to me appearing remote or “not accessible” and I completely understand. However, I wouldn’t pretend to be someone I am not. I trust all designers are different. It is just about being sincere. Remote and in a quiet environment is closer to my nature.
There is another thing, which is always a debate, it relates to the conventions, and archaic perception of Fashion designers.
Designers or creative directors in the current fashion industry have one foot in the studio, the other in the store, and both eyes on the stock exchange. The “controlling” cliché is maybe convenient but misleading. It is never about control, but about consistency, and there is simply no way around it within a global institutional house. There is no choice. Creative, strategy and management are now interconnected, and there is a lot at stake, including the image of an institution, thousand of employees and the responsibility toward shareholders.
In the end, the first collection was simply an introduction to certain codes.
I approached a laid back “psychedelic rock” silhouette that would emerge later, quite strongly today in music, and generally in fashion. I designed an indie wardrobe, reintroducing natural suede, long bohemian dresses with a vintage feel etc.
This was not in fashion at the time, neither was this attitude and “nonchalance,” or my arty casting. The casting was coming straight from my photography, bleached androgynous indie girls, the girls I know, melancholic, hair undone, almost no make up. They were individuals, not a beauty contest, the kind of intriguing beauty I understand. It was probably not at the time the idea the audience had of a luxury brand. This casting was a radical shift.
So all of these factors were arguably in the picture during the launch of my first collection. The distance, the perception, the new exoticism of California, as a transposition from Morocco, had also a lot to do with it. My new approach was about realism, and what was around me, but miles away from the prevailing conceptual and immaculate approach of woman’s fashion in 2012.
By now it is obvious that your tenure at Saint Laurent has been a complete success in terms of sales, influence, and acclaim. But at the time did the criticism make you second guess yourself? What gave you the strength to stick to your course?
Quite the contrary, my determination was only stronger. If there is no reaction, it means nobody cares. If nobody cares, then we have a problem.
I always kept Pierre in mind. How to sail in a middle of a storm and keep your route? Pierre always knew how to do that, and how to stay firm on his principles and not compromise the sincerity of his message, no matter what it takes, even if you are initially misunderstood.
Besides, criticism and polemic somehow allowed me to simply go straight to the point, take the highway. If you have a lot against you, you have nothing to lose, and you win your freedom. It is an open road to focus and pursue your goal with no strings attached. No more insecurity and need to please, no risk of stalling, no compromise. It was obviously never about the perception anyone could have of me. It was about Yves and Pierre, it was about the house and only the house, giving the house of Yves Saint Laurent a perspective, a strategy, and a progression. This is the promise I had made, and I had to keep my word, whatever it meant for me.
Do you see any irony in - or indeed take any comfort from - the fact that Yves Saint Laurent himself incited enormous controversy at the beginning of his career?
I presume a little bit of both. Fashion without controversy probably feels like nonsense. Not that controversy is provocation. I have never been interested by provocation, only the nature of what I do seems sometimes to bring controversy. However, you need a discussion, a debate of ideas, it is healthy. Change is the essence of fashion.
What do you think of the state of fashion journalism in general? Has it been strengthened or weakened by the digital revolution?
It has certainly been challenged by the digital revolution, just like the rest of the Fashion industry. I have always been comfortable with the Internet, and was interested by the idea it was giving new means to speak your voice.
There is sometimes a risk with immediacy, and collateral damage with the news race. The lack of fact checking will certainly improve in the future.
On a different note, I was always interested in journalism. I grew up with the intention to become a reporter. Needless to say, and despite my attempts in political sciences prep school, it never worked out.
I do read the newspapers online everyday, and as a reader, I expect the absolute and rigorous truth, a professional sense of accuracy, and total independence.
This is a wonderful responsibility and a great privilege for a writer.
Which fashion writers or publications do you follow or admire?
I see interesting writers appearing all the time. I like the concept of blogs, and the multiplicity of voices, the global discussion. The way it has forced the establishment to change its perspective. The evolution is exciting, even if designers end up extremely exposed, always on the hot seat. There is naturally the question of the independence of the blogs, who finances them, are they free from the power of advertising, or any other sort of conflicting situation. Overall the wide range of voices allows for a fresh perspective.
It seems to me that most of the critical reaction was provoked by the fact that your first collection represented a break from conceptual fashion, which had dominated the runways for the previous decade. Change always tends to incite controversy. Why did you feel this was the moment for a new direction in fashion?
I can only speak for myself, and there are many different perceptions of what is current in fashion.
I was just doing other creative projects for many years other than design, and I observed fashion shifting toward a sense of abstraction. There was also simultaneously this global evolution toward “Everything contemporary.“
The digital shift in architecture that occurred in the early ‘00s, but also in furniture design, illustrator or 3D fashion design, the explosion of the contemporary art scene and collector frenzy started to feel generic. I lost interest for everything “contemporary” or vaguely conceptual-related around 2007 (which does not mean I don’t follow interesting things happening along those lines today, it is a general concern).
I felt there was a need to move forward to something “post-contemporary,” so to speak, escaping a picture-perfect-puritan area. Something like what came after the influence of Space Age in the late 60s. The shift was rather on the street, a gap of generations.
My change of perspective happened through photography at first, going back to a sense of reality, unprocessed, and developed to all things designed and/or artistic.
Everything around us looked like it was coming out of a freezer. Do I still want a contemporary home, a techno fabric design sofa, and a conglomerate art gallery painting on my wall, acquired at an international art fair? This sleek reflective world had become extremely normative, a safe language and a conventional commodity.
The early ‘00s were long gone and I felt disconnected to something that for me looked somehow from the past, even if I had been active, excited, and part of this movement at the time.
I would now rather explore an analog world, that could bypass the botoxed-digital revolution, an alternative aesthetic that feels emotional, moving and warm, slightly wrong or chaotic at times. Anything but a deadly digital flat screen world.
Each of your runway shows has a distinct mood, but your designs can also be said to evolve from season to season rather than representing a complete 180-degree turn every six months. That’s apparent in the permanent collection but also in the way the wearer can combine items from one runway collection with items from the next. The clothes aren’t instantly obsolete. How important is that to you?
It is the idea of the effect of time, the affective quality of the clothes, the storytelling side of it for each person that wears them, and keeps them over a period of time.
Next to this idea, I am attached to a “lightness” in the definition of fashion, a certain hedonism, maybe closer to the perspective of fashion in the 70s and 80s. A dress to get laid, dancing shoes, a prom suit, anything that makes someone feel good about themselves and confident, without going too deep into concepts or being dead-serious about the clothes.
Finally, I design individual and customized accent pieces, closer to the costumes produced for musicians within the tradition of stage wear. The last men’s and cruise collection are a good example of this. Those pieces are limited editions but still within the spirit of my indie wardrobe. The representation is identical and consistent regardless of the season.
Do you think your background in menswear, which at its core revolves around the interpretation of iconic items, has influenced your approach to womenswear?
Possibly. Menswear is about perfecting the same pieces over and over again. It is a personal taste for classic or what you call iconic items.
At the time of my first collection, in the only interview I did with Olivier Lalanne at French Vogue, I was mentioning the idea that the press questioned, during my first two shows, “Le vestiaire,” the wardrobe (I named it the “permanent collection“). I wanted to design, next to or within the show collections, an evolving wardrobe of simple and really well made items for both men and women, most of the time unisex pieces. Arguably, simplicity is not an easy thing to achieve, in any creative field. Just as I like Rohmer or Téchiné movies, or an intimate song on an acoustic guitar, I like the idea to design simple pieces.
In that respect, I felt a distance with my early days in design, as I was now in a different place, with the idea of perfecting something apparently simple with a sense of credibility, authenticity and longevity. There was besides no difference with what Pierre had told me when I came back in 2012: “Remember Yves sent a peacoat on his first passage for his first runway, not an evening gown.”
One of the things that sets you apart is the perfection of each individual garment, the almost magnetic sense of desirability your clothes inspire when you see them in a store. I think how often other designers get it wrong, by having the wrong fit or the wrong fabric or adding too many details or too few. It seems to me that, when you design an army parka for example, you are seeking to find the essence and the ideal form of that item. Can you talk about that process? Does it involve a lot of hit and miss, with multiple samples and so on, or does it come together quickly? Can you give an example of how a specific garment came together?
This is a long process in fittings, editing ideas, and looking for that sense of effortless and organic feel. This is also constantly training the ateliers, and factories, for the hand, the finishes.
Avoiding unnecessary detail, an awkward pocket, no conceptual proportions or construction, simplifying with the best quality possible.
There is also the reconstitution of authentic fabrics, produced where they are historically meant to come from, developing an expertise and uncompromising precision around those items.
I also always have this idea that it has to look vaguely wrong to feel right. There is the fine line for anything to feel authentic. This is for me the most important inner quality in design, probably informed by photography.
A designer leather or suede jacket for instance is difficult to wear unless it feels it has always been there, believable, and authentic enough.
It takes also forever to make the clothes look like they have always belonged, the credibility of it all. It is an expertise that you keep pushing. You try until it feels just right, and will age accordingly, looking better with time, and looking like you own the clothes you wear. This principle of authenticity applies to everything.
Any piece has to feel real, from an evening gown that needs a perfect luxury and couture execution, to a leather jacket or a pair of denim that can’t feel “designed.“
It is not about “high and low,” but a certain “noblesse” in everything if the execution feels just right.
There is also another element of edge. The issue of “good taste” versus a hint of “vulgarity” or a hint of “risqué.” I never felt comfortable with the frigid and conservative idea of “good taste.” Slightly wrong, slightly off, is what I understand. The right “off,” the right “wrong.”
I agree that it was a fantastic read and it's really nice to finally read something directly from Slimane himself. Despite me not always liking what I see in his collections for YSL, I also feel a bigger appreciation for his efforts after reading the interview; it tells me he's really thought about the ideas on what he wants done for the fashion house, and a majority of his ideas are founded on original roots that Yves Saint Laurent had for the house himself. 
)he's going for a very specific aesthetic. It would be interesting to see what Slimane could come up with if he took a more... frivolous and light-hearted approach to designs but at the same time it would feel unauthentic from him.
... and likeable. I still find his collections an eyesore, and I disagree about how he brought back aesthetics that had been left behind for a while, they were not around because they had just left, down to the Supreme management girl, people were so done with it hence the criticism, and they've cut some slack now mostly for the status of wearing SL. 
Don't get it.