PARIS — Legendary designer Yves Saint Laurent, who reworked the rules of fashion by putting women into elegant pantsuits that came to define how modern women dressed, died Sunday evening, a longtime friend and associate said. He was 71.
Pierre Berge, Saint Laurent’s business partner for four decades, said he had died at his Paris home following a long illness.
A towering figure of 20th century fashion, Saint Laurent was widely considered the last of a generation that included Christian Dior and Coco Chanel and made Paris the fashion capital of the world.
In the fast-changing world of haute couture, Saint Laurent was hailed as the most influential and enduring designer of his time. From the first YSL tuxedo and his trim pantsuits to see-through blouses, safari jackets and glamorous gowns, Saint Laurent created instant classics that remain stylish decades later.
When the designer announced his retirement in 2002 at age 65 and the closure of the Paris-based haute couture house he had founded 40 years earlier, it was mourned in the fashion world as the end of an era. His ready-to-wear label, Rive Gauche, which was sold to Gucci in 1999, still has boutiques around the world.
Saint Laurent was born Aug. 1, 1936, in Oran, Algeria, where his father worked as a shipping executive. He first emerged as a promising designer at the age of 17, winning first prize in a contest sponsored by the International Wool Secretariat for a cocktail dress design.
A year later in 1954, he enrolled at the Chambre Syndicale school of haute couture, but student life lasted only three months. He was introduced to Christian Dior, then regarded as the greatest creator of his day, and Dior was so impressed with Saint Laurent’s talent that he hired him on the spot.
When Dior died suddenly in 1957, Saint Laurent was named head of the House of Dior at the age of 21. The next year, his first solo collection for Dior — the “trapeze” line — launched Saint Laurent’s stardom. The trapeze dress — with its narrow shoulders and wide, swinging skirt — was a hit, and a breath of fresh air after years of constructed clothing, tight waists and girdles.
In 1960, Saint Laurent was drafted into military service, an experience that shattered the delicate designer, who by the end of the year was given a medical discharge for nervous depression.
Saint Laurent returned to the spotlight in 1962, opening his own haute couture fashion house with Berge. The pair later started a chain of Rive Gauche ready-to-wear boutiques.
Nowhere was Saint Laurent’s gift more evident than the valedictory fashion show that marked his retirement in January 2002.
Forty years of fashion were paraded in a 300-piece retrospective that mixed his creations of yesterday and today in one stunning tribute to the endurance of his style.
In his own words, Saint Laurent said he felt “fashion was not only supposed to make women beautiful, but to reassure them, to give them confidence, to allow them to come to terms with themselves.”
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