Legendary Designer Yves Saint Laurent Dies at 71

[annamaria]

Au Revoir Monsieur...

 

[MissMagAddict]

Source | Telegraph UK

It Has Always Been All About Yves
He invented the modern wardrobe, and Yves Saint Laurent's spirit will live on in all of ours, says Hilary Alexander

The atmosphere before his Paris shows was not just filled with excitement; it bordered on reverential.

The gilded chairs were always carefully named with cards in copperplate script, the front-row seats occupied early by the "party faithful" - Catherine Deneuve, Baroness Hélène de Rothschild, ballet dancer Zizi Jeanmaire, muse Betty Catroux, and a proud mother, Mme Mathieu Saint Laurent.

A simple catwalk would bisect the length of the room, its entrance, against the far wall marked by a vast archway of fresh flowers and foliage.

It was from here that the models would emerge, wearing impeccably tailored trouser suits, skirt suits and dresses, followed by a parade of Little Black Dresses and increasingly elaborate evening gowns, culminating in la mariée, the wedding gown, variously inspired by Shakespeare, Verdi and Velázquez.

A fashion show, or defilé, by Yves Saint Laurent was always a stylised affair. But just as Yves Saint Laurent based his life upon "style" rather than "fashion", so his shows were never "spectacles", but an opportunity to parade clothes in which women would feel comfortable; his designs would take them from dawn-to-dusk, to any event, anywhere in the world.

Away from his beloved atelier in avenue Marceau, lost in what he called "the total silence of clothes", was a shy and tortured soul.

Often, in the Nineties, his catwalk presentations were edge-of-the-seat events as Saint Laurent himself emerged to take his bow, sometimes trembling, often stumbling, but always impeccable. It was touch-and-go, at times, as to whether he would make it to the end of the catwalk. But he always did, to be greeted by his "bride" and a bevy of adoring models.

Just visible inside the floral archway, his lifelong friend, Loulou de la Falaise could always be glimpsed handing out jewellery to the models; his partner and former love, Pierre Bergé, would be smiling and clapping, one sensed, with a certain sense of relief.

Bergé once described Saint Laurent as having "been born with a nervous breakdown". But without his personal obsessions, it is doubtful whether he would have made such an all-encompassing contribution.

We need only glance at the key looks of this summer: the return of safari chic; the re-emergence of the trouser suit; fashion's flirtation with artists; the latest "global culture" references.

They are all such hardy style perennials that we take them for granted. It has taken the death of Yves Saint Laurent to remind us where those inspirations originated, where indeed most of the clothes and ideas we wear today began - and on whose catwalk.

YSL - the most famous brand initials in the world - was a true genius, a world apart. He did not need trickery or stunts like the headline-seeking mavericks of today. Though his innovative ideas caused outrage in a pre-feminist world, his ethos and his passion were always elegant wearability.

This month marks the annual graduate fashion season, and up to 1,000 young hopefuls will seek to become "the" name in fashion. What a challenge: indeed, it is an almost futile one. Virtually any trend you care to name was first explored by Yves Saint Laurent.

His rollcall of "firsts" has, over the past five decades, formed the basics of the contemporary working wardrobe. We call them classics; he and Bergé knew them better as YSL creations.

He paved the way for androgyny, creating "le smoking", what we know as tuxedo-chic, in 1966 - the same year he opened his Rive Gauche boutique on the Left Bank; he was the first couturier to make the crossover into the mass market via ready-to-wear; and he scaled new heights of controversy with his black leather and PVC collection based on the Beat Generation. His "Saharienne", forerunner of today's safari-style, made its first appearance 40 years ago.

He was also the first couturier to use black models, the first living designer to be honoured with a retrospective - organised by Diana Vreeland at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, in 1983 - and the first to be quoted on the stock market, in 1989.

As early as 1965 he was exploring the links between fashion and art with his "Mondrian" designs, followed by collections inspired by Pop Art and, later, those that saluted Serge Diaghilev and Picasso, Van Gogh, the Impressionists and the Cubism movement.

Saint Laurent also had a recurring love affair with "costume", applied in designs for the ballet, opera and the cinema, and triumphantly realised with his extravagant "Ballet Russes" collection in 1976.

Together with Coco Chanel and Christian Dior - whose assistant he became in 1954, and whom he briefly replaced, at the age of 21, before opening his own maison in 1961 - Yves Saint Laurent was modern fashion. But it had become, perhaps inevitably, a world that had lost much of its charm for him.

He said in 2002: "I have nothing in common with this new world of fashion, which has been reduced to mere window-dressing. Elegance and beauty have been banished."

Much of the elegance and beauty he espoused, however, remains in the legacy he bequeathed and which continues to inspire those who aspire to be well dressed.

 

[MissMagAddict]

Source: Telegraph UK

Yves Saint Laurent: he was a man's man too

Yves Saint Laurent cared little for designing men's clothing. As a man who always avoided machismo, he seemed to find safety in women's fashion, away from the male world he found so terrifying. Yet he had a profound effect on what men wore. What he wore, and the way he wore it, triggered a sense of freedom in the men of his generation.

And because he had sway over the hallowed decades of the Sixties and Seventies, his influence on men today is magnified immensely.

Saint Laurent's personal appearance changed at the same rate as his womenswear. He started as a teenager in the Christian Dior couture salons wearing suits just stiff enough to match the surroundings. But, as he set up his own label and loosened the shackles that had held back women's clothing, his own dressing style became more flamboyant.

Sometimes, it was just a little touch of drama, such as an extravagant bow-tie worn with his softening suits, or the white kaftan he wore at his Moroccan home.

Then came the pieces he favoured that inspired his most famous womenswear innovations: the tuxedo he often sported at Studio 54 in New York, or the safari jacket with a decorative belt at the hips that he wore to open the doors to London's Rive Gauche store, in 1969.

Who could forget the white wedding tuxedo he made for Bianca Jagger? But there, by her side, also wearing YSL, was Mick, the tight decadence of his three-piece suit encapsulating the hedonistic freedoms of the time. It was a suit in the style of the designer himself.

Yves Saint Laurent has often been called shy, yet he was a man of extraordinary guts. In fact, one of his most challenging moves of all was to appear completely naked in his 1971 advertising campaign for the YSL male fragrance.

Either by accident or by design, he emboldened and empowered men to embrace style, rather than seeing it as the preserve of women - a spirit that lives on at his label today.

But Saint Laurent had his own potent trademark: his wide-framed glasses. The specs had an exaggerated awkwardness that heightened the contradiction of this fragile figure who embraced deviation with such strength.

It's a contradiction that present-day YSL designer Stefano Pilati plays on with his menswear, like the current collection's clash of heavy-soled shoes worn with softly draped artisanal clothes.

Pilati infuses his clothes with Saint Laurent's Left Bank spirit, but consciously keeps away from using obvious references to the designer, such as the glasses. They have too much power by themselves - the symbol of a man who, although racked with self-doubt, was able to realise himself as a designer of utter conviction.

 

[MissMagAddict]

1957

source | nytimes

 

[MissMagAddict]

source | independent.co.uk

In this 1967 photo, a model wears an African style dress
embroidered with wooden beads, pearls and sequins

Yves Saint Laurent, surrounded by some of his models, accepts the applause from the
audience at the end of his 1984 Spring ready-to-wear fashion show in Paris

 

[CholoChic]

I was reading about his work, and he was an admirable man,
its incredible, how a man can change the world
and he literally did it.

His work is so espectacular, so beautiful pieces, such a master beauty!!!
good bye great guy...
I dreamt about Yves and his work all night long after a terrible day...
what a sweet dream! what a sad reality!

 

[MissMagAddict]

source | independent.co.uk

Yves Saint Laurent hand kisses model Claudia Schiffer,
on January 22 1997 in Paris

A cavalcade of colour at Yves Saint Laurent's retrospective final couture show in Paris in January 2002

 

[r_r_r]

Its devestating, he was one of my top designers.

He made such a heavy impact on the fashion world, and his inspirations will live on forever.

May your soul rest in peace, you will surely be missed...

 

[tylw]

Carine Roitfeld's Homage to YSL
vogue.fr

 

[tylw]

Francois Pinault & Francois Henri Pinault's homage
vogue.fr

 

[tylw]

Jean-Paul Gaultier's homage
vogue.fr

 

[tylw]

Valentino's homage
vogue.fr

 

[tylw]

Christian Lacroix's homage
vogue.fr

 

[tylw]

Vivienne Westwood's homage
vogue.fr

 

[MissMagAddict]

Source | WWD

GONE, NOT FORGOTTEN: The French media is preparing for a week that will be all about Yves.

TV channels have juggled schedules to pay homage to Yves Saint Laurent, who died in Paris Sunday. On the day of his funeral service Thursday, Paris Première will broadcast his final runway show, while public station France 5 will rerun "L'Atelier de la Mode," tracing his life, presented by Virginie Mouzat and featuring Pierre Bergé, which will be run again on Friday.

Elle magazine is creating a special edition dedicated to the designer, due out before the end of the week. And the first of an inevitable slew of YSL tribute tomes, a new biography: "Yves Saint Laurent — l'Homme Couleur de Temps" (Yves Saint Laurent — The Man, The Color of Time), will be unveiled next Wednesday at Paris' Hotel Placide, featuring a preface by the late designer. The 200-page work was penned by Fiona Lewis, described as an intimate friend of the designer.

Saint Laurent muses Mounia and Aissatou are expected at the event.

French newspapers continued heavy coverage through Tuesday. The cover of Le Figaro's lifestyle section featured a photo of Saint Laurent exiting his final show under the headline "Définitivement Génial" (Definitively Brilliant) together with an accolade by his biographer Laurence Benaïm, which preceded the four-page spread.

Libération's front page pictured a young Saint Laurent backstage in 1972, and its 12-page spread included extracts of his retirement speech in 2002. France's National Audiovisual Center (INA) has delved into its television and radio archives to offer a selection of Saint Laurent's interviews on its Web site, such as one back in 1958, when Saint Laurent explained his controversial remark that there is no such thing as an American fashion, all fashion comes from France. Other archived media reports include the spectacular runway show before 80,000 spectators in the Stade de France during the Soccer World Cup in 1998.

Meanwhile, headlines like the Daily Mirror's "Man who let women wear the trousers," set the tone in the British press. Variations on that theme included an article in the Guardian's G2 section headlined, "Forget burning bras — feminism was built on the trouser suit."

The Independent featured a portrait of Saint Laurent on the cover of its Extra section Tuesday, with the caption "Adieu, Yves" and devoted six pages of the supplement to the designer's career. The Daily Mail, the Daily Express and the Sun all ran double-page articles and photo spreads charting Saint Laurent's best-known looks. And Lisa Armstrong of the Times wrote a double page article about his influence, with pictures of the Safari collection, Le Smoking and the Mondrian Collection.

 

[tylw]

Foundation Pierre Berge YSL

 

[tylw]

Le Style Saint Laurent
vogue.fr

 

[tylw]

vogue.fr

 

[MissMagAddict]

Thank you for the images tylw

I noticed you hotlinked the images from vogue.fr. It would really be a shame if in a few months from now all the pictures turn into red X's because vogue.fr either removed the images or changed the url...that would pretty much ruin this thread for any members wanting to view it the future.

In the future you should consider saving the pictures to your own computer and uploading them via tFS's image attacher...or an image hosting site...it's actually quiet easy.

 

[tylw]

^ thanks MMA, i usually do, but I never had problems with Vogue photos (but maybe you know better!

i will upload them to flickr when I get a chance, since Imageshack seems to be blocking photos from being shown on this site...