A soft but thorough take on the life and legacy of the neurotic,
brilliant designer. Born in 1936 into a French upper-middle-class
family in the Algerian town of Oran, Yves Saint Laurent was a
slight, quiet boy tormented by his classmates. As a teenager, he
dreamed of designing theater sets, but a fashion design contest in
Paris-Match prompted him to submit some sketches; he won third
place. In Paris, fate led him to an assistant's position at Dior.
The famous designer died unexpectedly in 1957 and Saint Laurent, at
the age of 21, became the firm's principal designer. He spent the
next several decades shocking and moving the public, shifting
hemlines several inches from one season to the next, offering his
unorthodox takes on the Beat movement, Pop Art, and hippie culture,
mingling elegance and comfort in his designs. Guided by Saint
Laurent's tyrannical lover, Pierre Berge, the company, despite
numerous setbacks, was built into a multimillion-dollar enterprise.
Saint Laurent's loyal clients included Catherine Deneuve, Bianca
Jagger, and Marie-Helene Rothschild. Things began to go wrong when,
in his early 30s, Saint Laurent became addicted to a variety of
drugs; they left him a nervous, strung-out wreck and made him a
chronic habitue of sanitariums. His collections deteriorated; even
a brief resurgence in 1990 could not halt Saint Laurent's
withdrawal from the limelight. He is now, the book suggests,
largely a recluse. Unfortunately, while Rawsthorn, who has covered
fashion and other industries for the Financial Times of London,
offers a fact-filled narrative, she never convincingly grasps her
subject's personality. She is clearly more comfortable dealing with
the world in which Saint Laurent moved, and the great internal
changes in the fashion business over the last several decades, than
with his character. Yet her study fails to catch the verve and
transcendent quality inherent in Saint Laurent's best work. A
frustrating and dispassionate study of an enigmatic figure and his
glamorous and decadent milieu. (Kirkus Reviews)
An in-depth analysis of the business empire set up by Yves Saint
Laurent's lover Pierre Berge and an insight into the life of a
tragic 20th-century genius.
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