Yves Saint Laurent Watch Collection - Every Watch He's Been Spotted Wearing
Yves Saint Laurent currently has 1 watches in his collection. Check them in our database.
Introduction to Yves Saint Laurent
Yves Saint Laurent was one of the most consequential figures in twentieth-century fashion. Born in 1936 in Oran, Algeria, he rose to international prominence after succeeding Christian Dior as head designer at the Dior house at just twenty-one years old. He later founded his own eponymous maison in 1961 alongside business partner Pierre Bergé, going on to reshape modern fashion with innovations that included the women's tuxedo suit, the safari jacket, and the use of non-white models on the runway at a time when the industry largely refused to. He was awarded the Council of Fashion Designers of America's lifetime achievement award in 2001 and retired in 2002, with his work now housed in dedicated museums in Paris and Marrakech.
The Yves Saint Laurent watch collection, as documented through archival photography, reflects a designer who applied the same considered restraint to his personal accessories as he did to his runway work. Irving Penn's portrait of YSL shows a Cartier Must de Cartier Tank on his wrist — a piece that fits neatly with what we know of his aesthetic sensibility. The Must de Cartier line was introduced in 1977 as part of Cartier's deliberate response to the quartz crisis, making the Tank format available in vermeil at a lower price point than solid gold versions, without compromising the visual architecture of the original design.
That Saint Laurent gravitated toward the Tank is telling. The case shape is rectangular, structured, and French in origin — qualities that aligned with his own design philosophy. The Must de Cartier Tank was not the rarest watch a man of his means could have worn, but it was a purposeful one, suggesting that his choices on the wrist, like his choices in cloth, were guided by conviction rather than ostentation.
Yves Saint Laurent Spotted Wearing Cartier Must de Cartier Tank in Vermeil Silver-Gilt
Inserted 03/12/2022
The Must de Cartier Tank was born in 1977 as a democratizing stroke of genius — a Tank-shaped entry point at a time when Swiss watchmaking was hemorrhaging market share to Japanese quartz. Shot by Irving Penn, Yves Saint Laurent wears his Must de Cartier Tank with characteristic understated authority. The vermeil case — sterling silver with gold electroplating — gave the line its distinctive warm tone. For YSL, a man who reduced fashion to its geometric essentials, the Tank's rectangular austerity was an obvious sartorial choice.
