Anthony Vaccarello: «It is important for me to empower women»

Super sophistication, couture attitude translated into today and super sleek silhouettes. These are the key elements of Saint Laurent's 2023 spring-summer collection, which was presented in a colossal location in front of the Eiffel tower. Speaking about his vision for women was Anthony Vaccarello himself, creative director of the Kering maison.

At first glance we can see very defined shapes, as in the last fashion show...

I want to keep this idea of super sophistication. With the inspiration to Martha Graham, I wanted to take the simplicity of knitwear that we made stretched, but infusing it with the Saint Laurent spirit, namely combining the colors and the whole attitude of Saint Laurent, such as the shoulders and the accessorizing, with the easiness of knit dresses. It is a woman that shows the couture attitude of today.

The silhouette is very clear. The styling is not exaggerated, but it is not minimal at all...

It is clean. We really wanted to be super sleek and clean, kind of minimal. However, we really had this idea of those strange Saint Laurent colors such as pink, a wrong pink.

From the history of Saint Laurent, you took moments that are not necessarily what everyone thought of in the 1970s and the 1960s. What inspired you?

I captured the moment from when I was a kid. I was really struck by those kinds of old fashioned women. Because when I see the portraits of Carla Bruni and Claudia Schiffer in Saint Laurent in the '90s and I think that those same girls were doing Helmut Lang at the same time, it feels like another world. I was surprised by how Yves Saint Laurent always kept an extraordinary elegance and did not care about this. And I want to keep this look but make it as he would have made it in the 1990s, for example, remaining modern and relevant while keeping that overfemininity.

It is less girlish and more woman. A true woman…

It is less teenager, more adult. I grew too.

It is a very powerful dress. The dress is back?

For me, it is important to empower women. This empowering idea is a little cliché, but the truth is, at Saint Laurent, the moment you see a woman you know she has the power.

Women in their forties now are not the same women of the 1980s. You talk to a wide range of women, from the ones in their twenties…

I do not do this to satisfy some needs. The collections are never thought in a commercial way, what I do I do because I feel it is the right thing for today. Being sexy in a different way. A different way of being sexy.

Why is there no purse on the runway?

Never. I love purses, just not in the show. For me, the show is telling a story, as it was a movie. Maybe one day, for the story, they will need a purse.

As it was for the 2022 Spring/Summer collection inspired by Paloma Picasso. There were some purses tucked into the waist of the pants in that one…

She does not need them now. (All rights reserved)