Yves Saint Laurent Mondrian Dress To Auction Despite Galliano Controversy

(MENAFN- USA Art News) An iconic Yves Saint Laurent Piet Mondrian dress from the 1960s will be auctioned by online house Fair Warning, in collaboration with Kerry Taylor Auctions. The sale, titled“The Impossible Couture Collection,” is scheduled for the evening of September 17, coinciding with the first day of London Fashion Week. This collection will also feature designs by Azzedine Alaïa, Elsa Schiaparelli, Paco Rabanne, and John Galliano.

The auction was curated by art collector Peter Brant Jr., son of art collector and publisher Peter M. Brant and supermodel Stephanie Seymour. Overseeing the sale will be Jussi Pylkkänen, formerly the global president of Christie's. The YSL Mondrian dress is anticipated to be the top lot, with a presale estimate ranging between $200,000 and $500,000. According to a press statement, it has been decades since a Mondrian dress of this significance appeared at auction, making this an exceptionally rare opportunity to acquire one of the defining objects of twentieth-century fashion.

Other notable items include a gold insect collar necklace designed by Elsa Schiaparelli, estimated at $15,000 to $30,000, and a custom dress from designer Lee Alexander McQueen's final collection, previously worn by Naomi Campbell, with an estimate of $600,000 to $1 million.

Despite the cancellation of Galliano's retrospective at the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute, the auction will proceed with five gowns and one drawing by the designer. Three jewelry pieces created by Galliano during his tenure as creative director of Dior will also be included. Galliano was fired from Dior in 2010 following antisemitic comments and was convicted of a hate crime in France in 2011. The priciest Galliano lot is a black gown from his spring 1995 collection,“Misia Diva,” which Madonna wore in her“Take a Bow” music video and Kylie Jenner donned in 2025 at the 78th British Academy Film Awards. Brant told Vanity Fair in an interview that he was“certainly disappointed” by the exhibition's cancellation, adding,“We were hoping that we would see some of these dresses on the red carpet.”

Source: ARTnews

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