Vintage Yves Saint Laurent, Rive Gauche Vintage Red Skirt
About the Item
- Designer:
- Brand:
- Dimensions:Marked Size: 36 (EU)Waist: 25 in (63.5 cm)
- Place of Origin:France
- Period:
- Condition:
- Seller Location:London, GB
- Reference Number:1stDibs: LU442311197162
Yves Saint Laurent
French fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent pioneered “cross-design” in fashion, taking inspiration from street trends to modernize haute couture.
Saint Laurent was the first to launch a ready-to-wear label, YSL Rive Gauche Prêt-à-Porter. He was the first couturier to open boutiques for both men and women. Using traditional menswear fabrics and designs for women, Saint Laurent also literally cross-dressed, giving men and women alike chic pant suits, elegant tuxedo jackets and urban safari gear. By blurring gender-specific design, he empowered individual style while creating a scissor-sharp fashion aesthetic of sensual ease and beauty. Many of his designs are today considered timeless classics. Saint Laurent also consistently used Black models, like Mounia, Iman and Naomi Campbell, and he drew endless inspiration from different ethnicities and cultures, in no small part because of his Algerian roots.
Born to French parents in Oran, Algeria, in 1936, Saint Laurent went to Paris at age 17 to study fashion at the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture. Just two years later, in 1955, his remarkable sketches were shown to Christian Dior, then the world’s reigning couturier, who hired him immediately.
Surprisingly soon thereafter, Dior publicly chose Saint Laurent as his successor, which sadly proved prescient when the fashion legend died unexpectedly, in 1957. A mere slip of a youth, the 21-year-old Saint Laurent was nevertheless up to the challenge. He shook the traditional couture clientele to its core with youthful silhouettes and styles like the A-line trapeze dress that hung with seeming effortlessness from the shoulders, the antithesis of the pinched waists and molded skirts that had been all the rage after the deprivations of World War II.
After a mandated spell in the torturous French military, Saint Laurent suffered a nervous breakdown and was dismissed by Dior in 1962. Out of the ashes rose the Age of Yves. With Pierre Bergé, his then-lover who became his lifelong business partner and friend, the designer founded Yves Saint Laurent YSL to encompass prêt-à-porter, or ready-to-wear. In 1966, they opened the first YSL Rive Gauche women’s boutique in Paris, followed soon thereafter by YSL Rive Gauche for men. Saint Laurent had given birth to a global brand.
His revolutionary Mondrian mini dress from 1965 is a core element of his fashion biography. It is a prime example of how Saint Laurent, an avid art lover and collector, looked to painters, from Goya to Picasso, Ingres to Matisse, for inspiration.
With its pure lines and hues, Mondrian’s ground-breaking 1935 color-block painting Composition C transmutes beautifully into a dress that is highly valued by collectors of contemporary fashion and widely copied commercially to this day. The design is the epitome of Saint Laurent’s aesthetic, requiring a meticulous hand piecing of each color block so that, despite the body’s curves, the visual plane is as flat as a canvas when the garment is worn. Mondrian’s purity met its match in Saint Laurent.
“I am no longer concerned with sensation and innovation, but with the perfection of my style,” Saint Laurent said four years before retiring, in 2002. After a long period of ill health, he died at his home in Paris on June 1, 2008.
Browse an extraordinary collection of vintage Yves Saint Laurent evening dresses, shirts, handbags and other clothing and accessories today on 1stDibs.
Yves Saint Laurent Rive Gauche
Visionary French fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent was the first to launch a ready-to-wear label, YSL Rive Gauche Prêt-à-Porter. The inaugural Rive Gauche boutique — a modern shop in Paris’s bustling, bohemian Left Bank district — offered stylish garments and accessories that were intended to be affordable for a younger generation of fashion enthusiasts. The store featured Mies van der Rohe chairs and played host to actor Catherine Deneuve during its grand opening.
Saint Laurent pioneered “cross-design” in fashion, taking inspiration from street trends to modernize haute couture. He was the first couturier to open boutiques for both men and women. Using traditional menswear fabrics and designs for women, he also literally cross-dressed, giving men and women alike chic pant suits, elegant tuxedo jackets and urban safari gear. By blurring gender-specific design, he empowered individual style while creating a scissor-sharp fashion aesthetic of sensual ease and beauty. Many of his designs are today considered timeless classics. Saint Laurent also consistently used Black models, like Mounia, Iman and Naomi Campbell, and he drew endless inspiration from different ethnicities and cultures, in no small part because of his Algerian roots.
Born to French parents in Oran, Algeria, in 1936, Saint Laurent went to Paris at age 17 to study fashion at the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture. Just two years later, in 1955, his remarkable sketches were shown to Christian Dior, then the world’s reigning couturier, who hired him immediately.
Surprisingly soon thereafter, Dior publicly chose Saint Laurent as his successor, which sadly proved prescient when the fashion legend died unexpectedly, in 1957. A mere slip of a youth, the 21-year-old Saint Laurent was nevertheless up to the challenge. He shook the traditional couture clientele to its core with youthful silhouettes and styles like the A-line trapeze dress that hung with seeming effortlessness from the shoulders, the antithesis of the pinched waists and molded skirts that had been all the rage after the deprivations of World War II.
After a mandated spell in the torturous French military, Saint Laurent suffered a nervous breakdown and was dismissed by Dior in 1962. Out of the ashes rose the Age of Yves. With Pierre Bergé, his then-lover who became his lifelong business partner and friend, the designer founded Yves Saint Laurent YSL to encompass prêt-à-porter, or ready-to-wear. In 1966, they opened the first YSL Rive Gauche women’s boutique in Paris — Rive Gauche is French for “left bank” — followed soon thereafter by YSL Rive Gauche for men. Ready-to-wear materialized during a period of dynamic transformation and experimentation and came to dominate the Paris fashion scene. Saint Laurent had given birth to a global brand.
His revolutionary Mondrian mini dress from 1965 is a core element of his fashion biography. It is a prime example of how Saint Laurent, an avid art lover and collector, looked to painters, from Goya to Picasso, Ingres to Matisse, for inspiration.
With its pure lines and hues, Mondrian’s ground-breaking 1935 color-block painting Composition C transmutes beautifully into a dress that is highly valued by collectors of contemporary fashion and widely copied commercially to this day. The design is the epitome of Saint Laurent’s aesthetic, requiring a meticulous hand piecing of each color block so that, despite the body’s curves, the visual plane is as flat as a canvas when the garment is worn. Mondrian’s purity met its match in Saint Laurent.
“I am no longer concerned with sensation and innovation, but with the perfection of my style,” Saint Laurent said four years before retiring, in 2002. After a long period of ill health, he died at his home in Paris on June 1, 2008.
The vintage YSL Rive Gauche clothing for sale on 1stDibs includes evening dresses and gowns, jackets, shoes, handbags and other items.
- ShippingRetrieving quote...Ships From: London, United Kingdom
- Return PolicyA return for this item may be initiated within 14 days of delivery.
- Vintage Lanvin Wrap Around SkirtBy Lanvin ParisLocated in London, GBA chic skirt by Lanvin. The skirt is in a red wool with a green and purple border at hem and front.Category
1970s French Skirts
- Vintage Quad Orange Long Skirt with Wonderful PocketsLocated in London, GBA fun vintage skirt by Quad. In a heavy orange cotton with white stitching, the skirt has two large front pockets and a front button opening.Waist 28'', length 45''Category
1970s British Skirts
- Vintage By Laddies Wrap Around SkirtLocated in London, GBA fun vintage skirt by ' By Laddies' . In a cotton print , the skirt is a mix of pink, yellow, purple and and white.Category
1960s English Skirts
- Vintage Red Full SkirtLocated in London, GBA wonderful red taffeta skirt. The full skirt has a 2 button waistband , makes a lovely noise when worn, and is unlined. Measurements: 25'', length 41''Category
1990s British Skirts
- Vintage Yves Saint Laurent Red SkirtBy Yves Saint LaurentLocated in London, GBA great vintage skirt by Yves Saint Laurent , Tricot line. The skirt is made of wool, and is fully lined. It has a pocket on either side, gathering at the front ,and a 5 button fron...Category
1970s French Skirts
- Alberta Ferretti Skirt in Plum ColoursBy Alberta FerrettiLocated in London, GBA great skirt for Fall by Alberta Ferretti,. The skirt is in a wool and silk mix , in tiers and wonderful plum and biscuit colours. It is fully lined with a side zip.Category
2010s Italian Skirts
- ALAIA brick red linen Knit Pencil Skirt SBy Azzedine AlaïaLocated in Zürich, CHAlaia pencil skirt in light brick linen (72%) polyamide (28%) with an elastic band at the waist detailed with amplified belt loops, two zippers on t...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Italian A-Line Skirts
- F/W 2015 Look # 24 NEW VERSACE RED SILK MINI SKIRT 38 - 2By VersaceLocated in Montgomery, TXVERSACE Actual Runway Fall/Winter 2015 Look # 24 Red Silk Mini Skirt Back zipper Fully lined Content: 100% silk, Lining: 100% silk Waist up to 26" Length 17" Made in Italy...Category
2010s Italian Skirts
- Red Beaded evening skirt Gianni Versace SeraBy Gianni VersaceLocated in Saint-Ouen-Sur-Seine, FRPencil skirt full embroidered with deep red beads on a red velvet base. Skirt opening on the left side of the skirt = 10 cmCategory
1980s Italian Pencil Skirts
- Moschino Cheap Chic Red Pleated SkirtBy Moschino Cheap and Chic, MoschinoLocated in Los Angeles, CAMoschino cheap chic red pleated skirt This classic red Pleated Skirt is vintage Moschino and as wearable today as when it was made - pair with black sweater and boots for fall. Bran...Category
1990s Italian Pleated Skirts
- Black, red and silver beaded skirt Gianni Versace SeraBy Gianni VersaceLocated in Saint-Ouen-Sur-Seine, FRPencil skirt covered black glass beads and silver sequences on red silk baseCategory
1990s Italian Pencil Skirts
- Moschino Cheap and Chic Red Wool Pencil SkirtBy Moschino Cheap and Chic, MoschinoLocated in Los Angeles, CAMoschino red wool pencil skirt Fall dressing shines wearing this Moschino skirt of a pop of red with a black turtleneck sweater tights and bo...Category
2010s Italian Pencil Skirts
Recently Viewed
View AllRead More
How to Spot a Fake YSL Bag
Counterfeiters know that savvy fashionistas cherish YSL bags. Learn how to tell if yours is the real deal. Of course, you don't have to worry about that on 1stDibs, where every seller is highly vetted.
Quiet Luxury May Be Trending, but These Famous Interiors Prove That Quality and Quirk Endure
Because truly timeless design requires personal vision, transcendent taste, real fortitude and top-notch objects, even if the wider world hasn’t caught on yet.