Yves Saint Laurent.
Photo: Getty Images.

The first Yves Saint Laurent exhibition in the UK will debut at Bowes Museum this July, reports British Vogue.

The retrospective, “Yves Saint Laurent: Style is Eternal,” will present 50 pieces spanning the designer’s career, including styles from his early days at the helm of Christian Dior and his art-inspired dresses. The show is a partnership between the Durham museum and Fondation Pierre Bergé-Yves Saint Laurent, Paris.

An avid art collector, Saint Laurent created famous Mondrian-inspired dresses, and paid homage in other creations to Diaghilev, Picasso, Matisse, Cocteau, Braque, and van Gogh.

“The Fondation Pierre Bergé-Yves Saint Laurent is committed to the promotion of the work of Yves Saint Laurent Internationally, and as such it is extremely exciting to work on this first exhibition in the UK,” Pierre Bergé, Saint Laurent’s partner in life and business, told British Vogue. “The Bowes Museum is a natural destination given its exceptional work with fashion and textiles; the museum and its location also clearly reflects Saint Laurent’s, and my own, passion for inspiring, timeless places. It is the perfect setting for us—a museum built as a French château, in the age of the Second Empire.”

The Bowes Museum was built in the 19th century by John Bowes, coal-mining heir, racehorse collector and illegitimate son of an earl, and his wife Joséphine. It houses an international collection of European fine and decorative arts that spans over five centuries and boasts work by masters such as El Greco, Goya and Monet as well as examples by Damien Hirst and fashion photographer Tim Walker.

“We are thrilled to work alongside the Fondation Pierre Bergé-Yves Saint Lauren on an innovative display that will introduce a dialogue between the designer’s body of work and the museum’s collection. This certainly is a great moment in the history of the Bowes Museum, as well as for fashion display in the UK,” said the museum fashion’s curator, Joanna Hashagen.

“Yves Saint Laurent: Style is Eternal” will be on view July 11 to October 25, 2015.