Pierre Bergé (86), Co-Founder of the famous French couture house, Yves Saint Laurent, passed away after a prolonged illness at his home in St-Rémy-de-Provence on September 8.
Bergé was Laurent’s partner in business as well as life and together they launched the label in 1961, which is now owned by luxury conglomerate Kering.
This model of partnership between a business visionary and creative genius is now a norm of the industry and has since then turned the business of Haute Couture from a largely intimate craft excursion to a thriving billion dollar industry.
Laurent and Bergé both came to fashion as outsiders with little understanding of the traditional system and perhaps that is what fuelled the winds of innovation for the Saint Laurent Empire.
Laurent had an unparalleled understanding of the socio-cultural dynamics and was already designing for Christian Dior at 21.
He was also the first ever designer to dress women in trouser suits, quite a revolutionary act for the time and is largely credited with the invention of the ‘hippie de luxe’ aesthetic that has now become a trending boho chic style du jour.
On the other hand, it was Bergé who led the duo to commercial prowess like suing the House of Dior to actually accumulate enough funds to launch the YSL brand. The fashion tycoon even unveiled the concept of luxury prêt-à-porter to the world by persuading Laurent to dabble with ready-to-wear.
Bergé made many bold moves throughout his time, making multifarious deals with luxury groups, at a time when such deals were unheard of in fashion. These strategic moves led the company to become the world’s first fashion design house listed on the Paris Bourse.
He devised the perfect simpatico relationship between a fashion firm’s business and design sides that CEOs continue to take inspiration from even today.
The art collector’s personal appreciation of ‘fashion and culture’ spearheaded the company’s active involvement in uplifting Paris as the world’s cultural capital and his passing is lamented by the entire industry.
Chairman and Chief Executive of Kering, François-Henri Pinault lamented the loss saying, “I will always remember him as ‘a man instilled with a fertile tension between avant-gardism and the will to work relentlessly to inscribe creation in history’. Pierre Bergé was at the same time a visionary precursor, a great patron, a creative and passionate businessman and a defender of noble and universal causes.”
