Yves Saint Laurent Gets A Heartbreaking Name Change

by Julia Rubin | 10:35 am, June 21st, 2012

When Fashionista published a post about Hedi Slimane dropping the Yves in Yves Saint Laurent, I didn’t want to believe it. Now WWD is confirming the rumor, and I’m heartbroken.

My very first fashion job was as an intern at YSL five years ago. I was doing visual merchandising in the creative services department, and I became enamored by the brand and its history. I loved the big flagship on 57th Street, but knew the Madison Avenue boutique — the first YSL outpost in the States — was truly special. I thought Stefano Pilati did Saint Laurent’s aesthetic justice. I dreamed of dressing in YSL, and I left the city with a coveted pair of Vichy print flats, with the iconic Cassandre logo inside, that summer.

The next year I was thrilled to be given an offer to return to the company. This was the summer Yves Saint Laurent died. Though he had not been associated with the house for several years at that point, everyone was devastated. My department was responsible for windows, and we took out all the mannequins so that only a photo of Saint Laurent against a black background remained.

Since my time at YSL, a lot has changed. In addition to Slimane replacing Pilati as creative director, there has been a ton of corporate turnover over the last few years. The Madison Avenue boutique has shuttered. Things are different there, but it is still the venerable house of Yves Saint Laurent — though that appears to be changing in a big way.

As per a YSL spokeswoman, Slimane is changing the name of the label from Yves Saint Laurent to Saint Laurent Paris, a nod to the fact that the ready-to-wear line was called Saint Laurent Rive Gauche when it debuted in 1966. (Saint Laurent was the first French couturier to design a complete ready-to-wear line.) The brand will “use the same fonts, and similar nomenclature, from that era”, though the Yves Saint Laurent name will be used for “institutional purposes”. The elegant Cassandre logo will continue to appear on apparel, accessories, and cosmetics.

I would like to think that Slimane, who designed for YSL Homme in the late ’90s, knows what he’s doing. But I cannot be the only one who feels an emotional attachment to the house in this way. There is some comfort in knowing that the name change — and all of the other inevitable changes — are rooted in the company’s history, but it still feels wrong. And sad.

Hedi Slimane Saint Laurent Paris Yves Saint Laurent Yves Saint Laurent

Anonymous

http://goo.gl/5yCHm
Candle Westmoreland

Oh for Christ’s sake. People which includes you find the most minimal things to stress about. St. Laurent Paris is a very dignified name and very up with the times. If you must stress, stress over something like the fact that this planet might not be hear by the end of the year and then none of this will matter.
http://www.pumpadores.com/ Madame Pump Adores

I too am an avid fan of Mr. St Laurent, unfortunately his time and era are long gone, never to return…luckily we have his fashions and his influence that will carry on in the annals of fashion history. I too cut my teeth on St. Laurent, however I am much older than you and my experience goes back 20 + years when I interviewed to be the boutique director for THE Madison Avenue flagship, and I went to the cavernous 57th street office overlooking Central Park for the meeting…Alas I was not destined to manage that iconic boutique but was a customer and still have ALL of the precious items I purchased when Yves St Laurent was still very much alive and very much the designer of his own brand. I miss him very much and consider the label only valid when he was at the helm….try as they might to re-invent genius, it’s nealry impossible with the closest success story being Lagerfeld for Chanel who has managed to maintain her spirit…….
Maxxine_kaufman

How can you change the name of such an iconic brand? Wrong and sad!!
Anonymous

Are you effing kidding? You insult someone over their emotional attachment over a brand with which they are closely connected and then proceed to spew such rubbish as the superstition that the world might end this year? You. Are. Ridiculous.
Anonymous

Yves Saint Laurent sounds so much more beautiful. I’m not down with the name change. But I mean I never knew the brand was previously called Saint Laurent Rive Gauche. So in time (and a lot of it) I’m sure Saint Laurent Paris will become the new norm. Ugh idk it just doesn’t roll off the tongue in the same way. : I am grumpy over the name change.

Yves Saint Laurent Gets A Heartbreaking Name Change

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