The death of Yves Saint Laurent is a reminder of how he revolutionised the lives of working women with the trouser suit.
Hillary Clinton certainly has reason to be grateful to Saint Laurent – and designers such as Liz Claiborne who followed him. Her devotion to the trouser suit (or pantsuit, as it is known in the US) has become a talking point in the contest for the Democratic presidential nomination.
Forty years later, it is difficult to recall the days when women had to be dressed in skirts or dresses in the office and there was an absolute sartorial divide between the sexes at work.
Saint Laurent’s pioneering of jackets and trousers for women was an important step in ending that era. Claiborne, who died a year ago, extended his innovation with affordable office wear for women.
More broadly, it is a reminder that fashion matters. Saint Laurent’s designs were an expression of social change: he caused an uproar in 1968 – a year of revolution in Paris – by suggesting that trousers should be every day wear for women.
Mad Men, the series about a Madison Avenue ad agency in 1960, vividly portrays the previous era, when women were treated as appendages to the men who ran things, but were expected to dress for their entertainment.
Perhaps Saint Laurent’s innovation was an expression of changing times rather than a revolution in itself. But he none the less struck a blow for equality in the workplace and deserves to be remembered for it.
