Even the most epic of journeys has to begin somewhere. Ask Saint Laurent’s Anthony Vaccarello, who last December unveiled his terrific spring 2021 collection via a movie of models walking in single file across shimmering and striated sand dunes which stretched (it appeared) into infinity. Now the house has released images of its spring 2021 pre-collection. Arriving in stores at any minute, it’s the curtain raiser on what we were treated to at the end of last year; the starting point for that desert odyssey of ’60s-meets-’90s molded longer line jackets, low-slung and slouchy pants, compact knit jumpsuits, short skirts, and lingerie looks which walked on the (tongue in chic) wild side as much as they did grains of sand. “I worked on spring during the confinement, so I was inspired by the idea of easy and more comfortable clothes which I continued in the pre-collection,” says Vaccarello.

A gimlet eye can detect how Vaccarello is kick-starting his spring line-up with this pre-collection. Next summer’s longer jacket is rendered here as a nifty double-breasted blazer, cut with the same masculin/féminin attitude of YSL of yore, and paired with fluid, high-waisted/high-cut shorts. That glorious Frederick’s of Hollywood vibe lingerie begins here with an armoire’s worth of lace and silk camisoles and slips, executed with the kind of vintage-y perfection that you’d only ever find in your dreams (or Kate Moss’s wardrobe, circa 1996). Their fretted delicacy lends a bit of softness to the likes of faded blue jeans, gilt-button cable-knit cardigans, and yet more of those shorts, cut from gleaming pliant leather. In other words: Why bother with a T-shirt when you could be wearing a camisole instead?

You might also see why the house held off showing this pre-collection until now. I mean, why spoil the surprise of seeing Vaccarello take on prints for Saint Laurent—a first for him, and deftly handled. There are pop-art blooms, a very Parisian matrix of polka dots, and a graphic daisy motif sourced from the house’s archive, which has more than a distinct whiff of those moments when Monsieur Saint Laurent riffed on the ’40s from the perspective of the ’70s. (Vaccarello gives his own nod to that decade mash-up, with several looks paired with his update of platform sandals which are redolent of Yves Saint Laurent’s iconic—and at the time, super controversial—ode to the 1940s that he showed in 1971.)