V&A
Black Red White Printed Wool Maxi Dress
1970s · 1970s · French
Designer
Yves Saint Laurent
Production
ready-to-wear
Material
printed wool
Culture
French
Movement
Hippie / Counterculture
Influences
ethnic textile patterns · 1970s maxi dress silhouette
A full-length dress with long sleeves and a flowing silhouette that falls to the ankles. The garment features an all-over geometric print in a diamond lattice pattern with circular motifs in red, white, and green on a black ground. The dress has a relaxed, unstructured fit typical of 1970s casual wear, with a simple round neckline and straight sleeves. The lightweight wool drapes softly from the shoulders without defined waistline emphasis. The bold, repeating pattern reflects the era's embrace of graphic prints and ethnic-inspired motifs, while the maxi length aligns with the decade's preference for floor-length casual dresses.
dressstraightround neckmaxi
Connected To
Movement·Hippie / CountercultureTechnique·screen-printing
VISUAL ECHOsame era · cross-culture
These two dresses capture the same 1970s hunger for "authentic" pattern-making, but from opposite ends of the counterculture spectrum. The French wool maxi wallows in dense, almost suffocating geometric repeats that feel like they're channeling some imagined tribal textile, while the British silk shift floats those same bohemian impulses into something lighter—its scattered motifs breathing across cream silk like a more tentative commitment to the revolution.
Echoes Across Time
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