Cocktail dress

Design House House of Dior French
 Designer Yves Saint Laurent French, born Algeria

Not on view

Part of Yves Saint Laurent's challenge in taking over as the head designer at Dior involved maintaining the feminine designs for the house was known, while simultaneously looking ahead. With this day dress, Saint Laurent referenced the New Look silhouette with a belt to emphasize the waist, but the dress itself is smock-like, much looser than Dior's designs. The use of a printed chiffon makes the dress even softer. Saint Laurent later used the peasant-blouse bodice paired with a wide cummerbund belt to acclaim for his own label in the 1970s.

Cocktail dress, House of Dior (French, founded 1946), silk, nylon, French

Due to rights restrictions, this image cannot be enlarged, viewed at full screen, or downloaded.

Open Access

As part of the Met's Open Access policy, you can freely copy, modify and distribute this image, even for commercial purposes.

API

Public domain data for this object can also be accessed using the Met's Open Access API.