SAINT LAURENT AFTER DARK: LEATHER, LIBERTINES AND LUXURIOUS HYDRANGEAS

Camz
Oct 1
3 min read

A garden that spelled it all out

From ground level, it looked like an innocent Parisian garden party. White hydrangeas in full bloom, their lush banks catching the night lights as the Eiffel Tower twinkled on cue to the left.

But from the sky? Drone footage revealed what the flowers had really been up to: spelling out those three sacred letters, YSL.

Of course. While our phones buzzed with the aerial revelation, Hailey Bieber, Zoë Kravitz, Central Cee, Jean-Paul Gaultier, Madonna and her daughter Lourdes paraded past the flashes. All in all, it was the kind of cinematic mise-en-scène only Saint Laurent dares to stage: an open-air spectacle where those without seats still pressed against the barriers for a glimpse.

A return to the louche aristocrat

Anthony Vaccarello, ever faithful to Yves’s codes but never shy of twisting the knife, began his nocturnal procession with sharp silhouettes that could cut you if you got too close.

Picture this: black leather biker jackets sculpted into power shoulders, cinched pencil skirts, and blouses so excessively pussy-bowed they looked ready to strangle any notion of domesticity.

These were not the prim secretaries of the 1980s. These were women who had clawed their way out of the office and into the night, stiletto slingbacks clicking against the gravel like warning shots. Vaccarello called them “louche aristocrats,” but really, they looked more like duchesses who had decided the revolution should start at midnight.

Cruising in leather

The mood thickened when the leather got radical. One model stalked the Trocadéro gardens in a full look of matching corset, skirt and jacket, topped with a black military cap.

Robert Mapplethorpe’s ghost was clearly pacing the runway.

Vaccarello admitted he’d been inspired by the cruising scenes of Paris in the Tuileries; except this time, the women were in charge, circling the monumental “YSL” in black leather, as if they owned both the garden and the gaze. Suddenly, the show felt less like fashion and more like performance art, flirting with taboo while Paris kept her poker face.

Nylon, nudity and bourgeois disobedience

And then came the nylon. Shiny, slippery, body-hugging nylon, cut into raincoats and day dresses that looked deceptively respectable until you realized there was nothing much beneath them.

From neck to knee, everything clung in a way that left little to the imagination. It was bourgeois dressing sabotaged from within, a wink at tradition that turned into a full-blown striptease.

Vaccarello shrugged backstage: “Yes, because it’s still about nudity.” As if that explained everything. Which, in a way, it did. Saint Laurent without nudity is like champagne without bubbles: technically possible, but why bother?

Nylon ball gowns in the night breeze

For his finale, Vaccarello indulged in Saint Laurent’s romantic side, but with his now-familiar trick of using unexpected fabric. Billowing gowns, voluminous skirts, furious ruffles all made of nylon.

They floated in jewel tones under the Paris night sky, catching the breeze like theatrical sails. Practicality, too: these gowns could apparently be balled up in a fist and stuffed into a bag. Couture for women who demand their drama portable. Still, the body was never completely hidden. Between the gusts of fabric, a thigh here, a curve there: softness, yes, but never surrender. “She’s not as soft as we think,” Vaccarello grinned. And the gowns, though grand, seemed to agree.

Conclusion: Paris at night belongs to Saint Laurent

What lingered, long after the final bow, was the atmosphere. Paris, dark and permissive, dressed in leather, nylon, and nostalgia. Vaccarello didn’t just resurrect Saint Laurent’s codes; he jolted them alive, paraded them through the garden, and let them tease us with contradictions. The hydrangeas spelled it out in case we had any doubt. YSL, forever tied to the night, forever playing with the line between elegance and provocation. And as the last guests slipped into black cars and the drones packed up, one thing was clear: Saint Laurent still owns the Parisian night, with a sly smile and a raised eyebrow.

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