Saint Laurent’s Paris fashion week show takes audience on a holiday to Fire Island

Sunglasses and bright colours dominated a beach-ready collection, as director Anthony Vaccarello namechecked artists who documented LGBTQ+ life

Fire Island, the holiday destination near New York, has been associated with the LGBTQ+ community since the 30s. It has inspired books (Edmund White’s 1973 novel, Forgetting Elena), a 2022 eponymous romcom and now, a fashion show for Saint Laurent.

Taking place at Paris fashion week in 30C heat more suited to a vacation, the show notes named the beach spot as a reference for the creative director, Anthony Vaccarello. They placed the show “somewhere between Paris and Fire Island, where escape becomes elegance, and desire becomes a language”.