Celebrating Yves Saint Laurent, Who Would Have Turned 90 This Month

A few years later, in 2014, director Jalil Lespert worked with Bergé to create Yves Saint Laurent, a fictionalization of the designer’s life and times. Bergé lent the filmmakers 75 ensembles, giving it an air of authenticity that remains unparalleled. It’s available to rent on most streaming platforms.

2. Follow the traveling exhibitions (while waiting for the reopening of the Musée Yves Saint Laurent Paris)

The museum, housed in the historic atelier on Avenue Marceau, is closed for a major renovation and expansion project and will reopen in the fall of 2027. The work will double the exhibition space and open areas previously inaccessible to the public—such as Pierre Bergé’s office—as well as a new documentation center.

Yves Saint Laurent’s atelier, reconstructed inside the Musée Yves Saint Laurent Paris.

BERTRAND GUAY/Getty Images

In the meantime, the Foundation continues to showcase the world of Saint Laurent through exhibitions organized at other institutions. Among the events not to be missed is “Yves Saint Laurent and Photography,” on view at the International Center of Photography in New York through September 28, 2026. The exhibition explores the relationship between the couturier and photography through more than 300 images, archival materials, and photographs by the great photographers of the 20th century who helped shape the Maison’s legacy.

At the same time, through September 28, 2026, the Musée Matisse in Nice is hosting “Henri Matisse – Yves Saint Laurent,” an exhibition dedicated to the dialogue between two revolutionaries of color. Through approximately 160 works—including haute couture garments, paintings, drawings, fabrics, accessories, and archival documents—the exhibition explores the deep connection between the artist and the couturier.

3. Read Yves Saint Laurent: The Scandal Collection, 1971

On January 21, 1971, Yves Saint Laurent presented his Spring-Summer Haute Couture collection. The result was a scandal. Mini-dresses, sky-high wedges, padded shoulders, bold makeup, and explicit references to the fashion of the Nazi Occupation years. The press called it “the ugliest collection in Paris.” The scandal was enormous, but short-lived: within a few seasons, that very aesthetic took over the streets, ushering in the vintage revival phenomenon and proving once again that Saint Laurent was always one step ahead of his time.