Hedi Slimane goes his own, defiant way at Saint Laurent

If anyone has been disrupting the fashion runway of late, it’s Hedi Slimane at Saint Laurent.

Since taking over the revered French fashion house in 2012, he’s dropped “Yves” from the name and chosen to base his atelier in Los Angeles instead of Paris. He grants few interviews in an industry that loves personalities, his collection is astronomically priced even by luxury standards ($595 ankle socks?), and he casts as many rockers in his ad campaigns as models — Marianne Faithfull, Courtney Love and Marilyn Manson to name just a few.

And yet Slimane’s defiant strategy is working, just as a similar strategy worked for Yves Saint Laurent in the 1960s and ‘70s when he appealed to the original youthquake.

Sure, much of what Slimane has done is to mine the pasts of both Yves Saint Laurent and pop culture. But how chic did le smoking look on Angelina Jolie and Gia Coppola? And the Kurt and Courtney grunge and Edie Sedgwick Mod references in recent runway shows were old friends; we hadn’t seen them for a while, and there’s a reason they endure. You have to look only as far as the latest blockbuster reboot to know that appropriation and recontextualization are all around us. And Saint Laurent fans don’t seem to mind.

Los Angeles retailer Elyse Walker reports that Saint Laurent is her No. 1-selling collection, and the label is making a strong showing on the red carpet too. Why? Maybe because the clothes look normal, as in not like the typical cupcake gowns we’ve come to expect at premieres and awards shows. Saint Laurent is glamorous in a reliable way, and that is somehow refreshing.

Here’s a roundup of the best Saint Laurent looks from the last few months. I look forward to seeing what Slimane has up his sleeve next, and who will be lucky enough to step out in one of the finale dresses from the fall 2014 runway show, featuring artwork from another master of appropriation, L.A. artist John Baldessari.

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