A Mondrian dress by French designer Yves Saint Laurent (www.ysl.com/)was snapped up on was snapped up on Thursday, star lot of a vintage sale held half a century after his fashion house was founded.
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Mondrian dress by French designer Yves Saint Laurent |
Sold for 30,000 pounds (35,000 euros, 47,000 dollars) the dress was part of a capsule collection of nine Saint Laurent pieces, dating from 1962 to 1970, at a Christie's clothing sale stretching from the 18th century to the 1980s.
Patricia Frost, director of Christie's textile department, described the dress, inspired by the work of Dutch abstract artist Piet Mondrian, as "a magic carpet piece, it takes you right back to 1966."
The London sale came just ahead of the 50-year anniversary of the founding of Saint Laurent's fashion house, on December 4, 1961. The couture house closed in 2002 when the designer stood down.
"Yves Saint Laurent French designer lives on everywhere you look," said Berge, now 81, who co-founded his fashion house and helped run it for 40 years. "The most important are perhaps those you notice less," he told AFP.
Berge's foundation has also sent travelling exhibitions of his work around the world, from Paris last year, to Madrid at the moment, and Denver, Colorado a few Fashion weeks from now.
"Yves Saint Laurent's clothes happen to make people look wonderful but they also have more depth to them," Frost said. "They should be looked at more as works of art. They are not really for wearing, they are more for museums."