By 1963 (at the age of 26) YSL was dressing beautiful celebrities like First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy and her sister Lee Radziwill. This was the year he showed women how to dress for their boots.
“Personally, I don’t believe a collection should be a revolution. The fashion press always wants a revolution. But I don’t think it’s possible anymore, in the old sense. What is important is evolution, a smooth line development that moves from one collection to another. Above all I want to set out my own recognizable personal style and not something that flip flops back and forth every six months just to make news.”
During this time the fashion world faced the issue of appealing to youth without losing the grace and style of couture. The media was ripping apart designer’s collections and in come cases, causing the collections to fail.
Fall of 1964 was a turning point for Saint Laurent’s career. He decided to have two separate fashion shows for buyers and the press. This way, the buyers could formulate an opinion on the collection without the media’s influence.
The Mondrian line he released was inspired by a Dutch painter (Piet Mondrian 1872-1944) who developed a style of non-objective painting based on the reduction of pictional elements and the elimination of curved lines and color. The collection was a huge success and YSL officially took off on his own.
Because of the high demand for his pieces, Saint Laurent’s dream was finally born and by the late 1960s, he opened a department store in the Latin Quarter (France) where all of his designs were sold together. He named the store, Rive Gauche.
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