Vaccarello Leaves Saint Laurent After 10 Years
Belgian fashion designer Anthony Vaccarello is stepping down as creative director of Saint Laurent after ten years at the helm of the French luxury house, owner Kering announced on Friday 9 October 2026. The departure ends one of the most commercially successful tenures in modern fashion and leaves Kering searching for a successor as it seeks to revive growth.
“Over the past decade, Anthony Vaccarello played a key role in the development of Saint Laurent, helping to strengthen its identity and its influence in the worlds of fashion and culture,” the brand said, according to RTBF.
A decade that transformed the house
Born in Belgium to Italian parents of Sicilian descent, Vaccarello graduated from La Cambre in Brussels in 2006, worked at Fendi, and launched his own label in 2009 before winning the ANDAM Fashion Award in 2011. He was appointed artistic director of Saint Laurent in April 2016, succeeding Hedi Slimane just four days after the latter’s abrupt exit.
Under his direction, Saint Laurent’s revenue nearly tripled, rising from just over EUR 1 billion in 2016 to EUR 3.2 billion in 2023, driven in particular by the growth of its menswear line, before plateauing as the wider luxury sector slowed. According to France 24, the house also became the first fashion brand to invest in film production, co-producing three films in competition at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival, including Jacques Audiard’s “Emilia Pérez.”
“During his tenure, Anthony placed Saint Laurent on a remarkable trajectory, elevating the House to the forefront in terms of desirability and image, while doing exceptional work, both creatively and in terms of cultural impact,” said Cédric Charbit, CEO of Yves Saint Laurent, in the Kering statement.
A final show that said it all
Vaccarello’s last show, on 29 September 2026 during Paris Fashion Week, was an all-gold Spring/Summer 2027 presentation. During the finale, he symbolically handed a set of keys to his five-year-old son seated in the audience — a gesture that intensified already-persistent rumours of his departure.
The designer also posted an Instagram film titled “Saint Laurent by Vaccarello” looking back on the decade, writing simply “A bientôt” (See you soon), with no further details.
The Vogue France critic Nicole Phelps, reviewing the final show, described Vaccarello as “as determined as he is discreet, a designer resolutely refusing to bend to trends,” and concluded with the Robert Frost line: “Nothing gold can stay.”
Commercial boom, then a slowdown
Vaccarello’s commercial record is unambiguous. During Slimane’s four years at the house, YSL revenue rose from EUR 354 million in 2011 to EUR 974 million in 2015. Vaccarello then built on that foundation, nearly tripling turnover to a peak of around EUR 3.2 billion in 2023.
But after that high point, Saint Laurent saw three years of declining revenue, falling to EUR 2.64 billion in 2025, with its operating margin contracting from 30.9% to 20%. Vogue attributes this largely to the general luxury slowdown and to YSL’s aggressive 2023 repositioning away from wholesale.
The broader pressure on Kering is significant. Under CEO Luca de Meo, the group aims for YSL to more than double menswear sales, triple jewellery sales, double very-important-client sales, and reach at least EUR 500 million in entry-level categories by 2030 — goals that will now rest partly on the shoulders of Vaccarello’s successor.
A cultural signature
Vaccarello’s creative signature — mixing everyday materials with haute couture craftsmanship, defined by transparency, leather, sculpted shoulders and a nocturnal aesthetic — re-established Yves Saint Laurent as “the most typically Parisian” modern fashion house, moving beyond Slimane’s subcultural documentary style.
He also built a modern “clan” of muses, including Anja Rubik, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Zoë Kravitz, Catherine Deneuve and Dua Lipa, echoing Saint Laurent’s own circle of women. In 2023 he launched Saint Laurent Productions, extending the house’s cultural reach into cinema.
For Belgium, the departure marks the end of another chapter in a celebrated fashion lineage. As RTBF noted, Belgians have become “unavoidable” at Paris Fashion Week, and Vaccarello — a La Cambre graduate — has been among the most prominent.
What’s next
“The House will announce its new creative direction shortly,” Kering has said, adding no further details. The name of Chemena Kamali, current creative director of Chloé and formerly of Saint Laurent, is widely cited as the frontrunner, though Kering has confirmed nothing.
Vaccarello, now 46, has hinted that his next projects could take him beyond fashion. Asked in 2024 what could follow Saint Laurent, he said it was “complicated, because simply being here is already a dream. Saint Laurent, for me, is the most beautiful house, the Holy Grail of houses. What could surpass that? The only thing one can do is to launch into something completely different… One has to aspire to new dreams that I don’t necessarily have yet.”
For now, one of fashion’s most commercially successful partnerships has come to a close — and both the house and its former creative director are entering uncertain, and closely watched, new chapters.