What makes Saint Laurent's collection of work so distinct is that none of his predecessors and peers, despite their luminous names, kept their original clothes in the same way. While other houses buy their dresses back from clients to build their collections, in the case of Yves Saint Laurent, what went down the catwalk was what got kept. His longtime partner in business and romance, Pierre Berge, who died last year, told Vogue that one day, the designer said to him: "I adore that dress; we must keep it." And so they did.
Nearly 55 years since the launch of his eponymous brand in 1961, two new Yves Saint Laurent museums opened. One opened on Oct 19 in Marrakech (appropriately enough, on Rue Yves Saint Laurent) and the other in Paris at 5 Avenue Marceau. Both exhibit a selection from the Fondation Pierre Berge -Yves Saint Laurent of more than 5,000 pieces of haute couture and 15,000 haute couture accessories, along with an array of sketches, drawings, photographs and other ephemera.
As befits such a vast collection, the museum in Marrakech occupies a 3,995 sq m space, with a 399.5 sq m permanent exhibition space designed by Christophe Martin. The building is a stone's throw away from the Jardin Majorelle, which was bought by Saint Laurent and Berge in 1980.
