Inside the new book Yves Saint Laurent and Photography you’ll find some of the most iconic fashion images of the 20th century. Images so recognizable and potent they have become part of the pop cultural visual language. Saint Laurent, that most lauded of createurs, delivered couture collections of devastating modernity from 1962 -1975 that defined the look of the ‘60s and ‘70s. And they also inspired some of history’s greatest fashion photographers as well: Richard Avedon, Jeanloup Sieff, Guy Bourdin, Franco Rubartelli, all contributed to the legacy of the storied maison. Saint Laurent wisely partnered with seasoned photographer Helmut Newton early in his ascent, and together they built up a body of work synonymous with each other. Newton, known as the King of Kink, became the “eye” of the house. And it is his photograph of Vibeke Knudsen on Rue Aubriot at night that arrests. First printed in the September 1975 issue of Vogue France, it is quite possibly the defining image of Parisian fashion in the 1970s.
By the pivotal year 1975 Saint Laurent was a bona fide fashion star. Forever at the edge of the zeitgeist, he released Eau Libre, one of the first modern unisex colognes. The advertising tested the limits of European bourgeois taste by featuring a black man and a white woman together. Four years earlier, he stripped bare for Sieff’s lens for his new cologne, Pour Homme Eau de Toilette. With his androgynous, Christ-like locks and chiseled physique, he became an unwitting pinup for the nascent Gay Pride movement. “I want to shock,” he told Seiff at the time. “I want a scandal.” Somewhat ironically, 1975 was also the year he broke with his modernist style for a more historicist approach.
After setting up his eponymous brand in 1962 with his partner Pierre Bergé, Saint Laurent steered fashion away from Christian Dior’s post war, hourglass silhouette with a precision that left little doubt who was in charge. But from FW 1976 onwards, his collections became ornate and decorative. Their lushness, ecstatically received, set the stage for the lipstick and lacquer style of the 1980s (a decade he lorded over). But it also meant his days spent in rigorous pursuit of absolutely modern clothing, that is to say, clothing charged with the essence of “now”, had come to an end. (In 1971, when asked by a journalist which garment he wished he would have designed, he replied “blue jeans”.) Yet in retrospect, his volte-face towards historicism in 1975 proved that, once again, his antenna was accurately attuned to his times as both “Modern” and “Modernism” was perceptively grinding to halt.
The cover of the book however shows a thoroughly Modern(ist) Yves. Shot by Harry Meerson in 1966, the images were used as promotional material for the opening of his first Rive Gauche boutique. The Pop Art inspired session also reveals the once timid boy of couture matured into a confident young man, one making a mark on culture. He followed the wild success of Rive Gauche with Pour Homme in 1969 with black leather, double-breasted maxi-coats in the year of Woodstock, Altamont Free Concert, and the Manson Murders. His much ballyhoo’ed Spring Summer 1971 haute couture collection of 1940s floozies practically invented the concept of “retro” although it wasn’t received that way at the time (“retro” had been an underground trend since 1968). ”He was like a sociologist,” said Betty Catroux, his close friend and muse. “He absolutely understood his time.”
And he was no slouch when it came to personal style either. His slim, long limbed frame seamlessly embodied the swinging menswear styles from 1964 – 1975. A photo of him taken by Bergé in 1967 finds him strikingly handsome as he reclines on a beach in mod white. A few years later he’d wear his Saharienne, a laced front tunic he originally designed for women, sparking the Unisex trend of the late Sixties. (Franco Rubartelli’s 1968 picture of German supermodel Veruschka wearing a Saharienne and holding a rifle over her head is yet another iconic image of 20th century fashion indelibly linked to the house). At home in Paris and Marrakech, he’d lounge around bearded in a thobe. “If I weren’t a designer, I would have liked to have been a beatnik” he said. But instead, Saint Laurent was the biggest and brightest fashion designer of the Modern Era.
Yves Saint Laurent and Photography ($69.95)
Published by Phaidon, Sept 4th, 2025
160 Pages, with 145 color and black and white images.
