MANILA, Philippines—As the world f fashion mourns the death of Yves Saint Laurent, who died Sunday at age 71 in Paris, France, local fashion’s foremost names also look back on how one of the world’s greatest designers had influenced their own careers.

“He had a grasp of the modern woman in that particular point in time, so that in anything I do, I’ve always been very conscious of that,” Inno Sotto says of the man who first put women in trouser suits (1966) and see-through dresses (1968).

Born in 1936 in Algeria, Christian Dior hired Saint Laurent as an assistant when the latter was just a teenager. Saint Laurent would eventually take over the House of Dior following his mentor’s sudden death in 1957. He was only 21 years old.

“Coco Chanel, Christian Dior and Saint Laurent were the most influential designers of fashion, in terms of silhouette, in terms of approach, in the way of dressing women of their generation,” Sotto says.

“When I was studying in the US,” Sotto adds, “he was ‘the’ designer. I was conscious of his work, in [store] windows, in magazines. He had a sense of theater and presentation, of himself, of his brand, of who he was. And somehow, in a way, it got into my whole consciousness.”

When Auggie Cordero bagged the top plum in the Ramon Valera competition in 1976, Cordero said his winning collection referenced Saint Laurent’s “flamboyant peasant outfit, the peasant blouse with double-layer Russian skirt, the quilted bolero.”

“Fashion is a dream,” Cordero says, ” and he made women aspire to have a Saint Laurent.”

At a time when the American designer Halston was espousing minimalism, Saint Laurent was at the opposite end of the spectrum, introducing fantasy dressing inspired by the Ballet Russes. “He added volume and ornate decoration, and he used luxurious materials like sable and feathers. In other words, he changed the scenery,” says Cordero.

As a young man in the 1970s who was starting to get interested in fashion, the designer Jojie Lloren says he was so taken by the Algerian-born designer’s Ballet Russes collection.
“Lukang-luka ako sa mga damit niya!” he says emphatically. “He was one of my icons… He had restraint in his design, always timplado. Gusto ko ganun din ’yung akin. He could be theatrical, but in a way that was glamorous, very special and dramatic.”

“Saint Laurent did many things na ’pag dumaan na sa kanya,” Sotto notes, “iba na. And I think it had something to do with his high level of sophistication. He was very cerebral.”

Art and fashion

Saint Laurent was also “first of many to recognize the importance of merging art and fashion,” Cordero says, citing Saint Laurent’s collections that were inspired by the works of great visual artists, like Mondrian, Matisse, Picasso, Van Gogh, Miró.

One local designer who was deeply influenced by those collections, according to Cordero, was Loretto, who created his own versions of clothes with Van Gogh’s images.

“I loved his beadings and couture details, his silhouettes and the timelessness of his clothes,” Loretto says. In the mid-1980s, he hand-painted dresses with Van Gogh’s “Sunflowers” à la Saint Laurent. “To this day, I would refer to his works.”

Sotto, whose personal and professional life bears some semblance to the late great designer, says: “What was good with Saint Laurent was that he had Pierre Bergé (the designer’s business partner and one-time lover), who made sure that he was everything that he should be. [Their partnership] evolved fashion into a brand, the first legitimate, real, honest-to-goodness, high-fashion brand.”

In his lifetime, Saint Laurent never made it to the cover of Time magazine, an honor that’s been accorded to many other, if less influential, designers of his generation. “He was bypassed many times,” says Cordero, who considers it a travesty. “He was shy about self-promotion, like Balenciaga, who was the most elusive. Saint Laurent was introspective; he had a temper… The likes of Courreges, Pierre Cardin, Ungaro, they were all doing pop art, and lahat sila na-outlive ni Saint Laurent. His influence had filtered down even to us.”