Anthony Vaccarello Elevates the Tuxedo at Saint Laurent

As he approaches his tenth year as creative director of Saint Laurent, Anthony Vaccarello seems more than ever to have mastered the delicate balance that ensures the longevity of a major fashion house: revisiting its icons without freezing them in time. On one side, the reinterpretation of cult pieces — most recently, the Mombasa bag was relaunched — and on the other, the pursuit of a bold, almost cutting-edge sensuality that keeps the brand firmly in the contemporary spotlight. This approach earned him, indeed, the title of 2025’s sexiest brand.

For Autumn/Winter 2026, it is the tuxedo’s turn to take center stage. This piece is inseparable from the house’s history. When Yves Saint Laurent introduced it for women in the late 1960s, the gesture was profoundly disruptive. Today, the tuxedo belongs to the common vocabulary of women’s fashion, yet at Saint Laurent, there is still that certain “je ne sais quoi.”

True to his approach as a total creative director, Vaccarello also draws on a broader cultural imagination, shaped by photography and cinema. The runway set, a cozy interior blending wood paneling, thick carpets, and vast windows overlooking the Eiffel Tower, reflects this vision. At the heart of the space, a reproduction of a bust that once stood in Yves Saint Laurent’s apartment acts as a subtle historical thread. Emerging from the wings, the YSL logo seems, too, to have traveled from another era, like a fragment of the 1970s or 1980s transplanted into the present. While the collection nods to these past decades, it remains thoroughly contemporary. The silhouettes walk a tightrope between femininity and masculinity, in a perfectly controlled balancing act. The extreme fluidity of the fabrics mirrors an even deeper fluidity: that of gender itself.

At Vaccarello’s Saint Laurent, the female figure is never monolithic. She is multiple. The show opens with eight female silhouettes in suits, asserting tailoring as the backbone of the wardrobe. The lines are precise, almost commanding, yet always infused with a… sensual tension. Lace gradually takes over from the tuxedo - or rather “the Tuxedo,” as it is affectionately referred to in the house’s lexicon. A dance of lace follows in ochre tones: burnt oranges, patinated yellows, deep browns. Transparency is omnipresent, yet the fabric surprises: rather than floating around the body, it clings, like a second skin. On the runway, Bella Hadid wears a silicone-coated lace dress that sculpts her body with almost architectural precision.

Speaking of skin, (faux) fur, the ultimate maximalist piece, appears in short, voluminous cuts, almost exaggerated in scale. The material seems to overflow the garment, as if refusing discipline. A sense of opulence is heightened by accessories: a casually knotted belt, adorned with a gemstone-studded buckle that catches the light. The jewelry also embraces this showy aesthetic - dramatic flowers, bold volumes, golden flashes: the 1980s are never far away. Vaccarello also plays with collars - crew necks, V-necks, rounds - as variations on a single silhouette, subtly modulating proportions to make each look resonate.

Repetition becomes a true principle of construction. The tuxedo appears fourteen times during the show, more than a third of all silhouettes. A way of emphasizing, almost insistently, what forms the beating heart of the house. With this collection, Vaccarello achieves a rare feat: appealing to both a bourgeois audience attached to classic codes and the new wave of Gen Z it girls. In the front row and on social media, figures like Lila Moss and Iris Law effortlessly embody this wardrobe. In this ongoing dialogue between past and present, Vaccarello demonstrates above all that Yves Saint Laurent’s legacy is not a relic. It is a living material, capable of captivating both the heirs of high society and the new generation of digital muses.