Pierre Bergé
Pierre Bergé
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Pierre Bergé

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Pierre Bergé

Pierre Vital Georges Bergé (French pronunciation: [pjɛʁ vital ʒɔʁʒ bɛʁʒe]; 14 November 1930 – 8 September 2017) was a French industrialist and patron. He co-founded the fashion label Yves Saint Laurent (YSL), and was a longtime business partner—and onetime significant other—of its namesake designer.

Bergé was born in Saint-Pierre-d'Oléron, on the Oléron Island, Poitou-Charentes, on 14 November 1930. His mother, Christiane, was a progressive teacher, who used the Montessori method. His father worked for the tax office. Bergé attended the Lycée Eugène Fromentin in La Rochelle, and, later, went to Paris. On the day of his arrival, as he was walking on the Champs-Élysées, French poet Jacques Prévert landed on him following a fall from his apartment window.

At the age of 18 in La Rochelle, I decided to leave my family. The day I arrived in Paris, I went for a walk on the Champs-Elysées when suddenly I saw a man go through a French window, fall through the air, grab at a store sign and crash at my feet. He was bleeding profusely. An ambulance arrived and took him to Marmottan hospital. The next day, I discovered in the newspapers that it had been Jacques Prévert. I have always considered it an omen that the same day I got to Paris, a poet fell on my head.

— Pierre Bergé

During his early years in Paris, Bergé met both Albert Camus and Sartre through his involvement in leftist organisations, including editing a short-lived leftist magazine.

Bergé also befriended and dated the young French artist Bernard Buffet, and helped facilitate Buffet's success.

Bergé met Yves Saint Laurent in 1958. They became romantically involved and together launched Yves Saint Laurent Couture House in 1961. The couple split amicably in 1976 and remained lifelong friends and business partners.

In 1992, Bergé sold shares of the fashion house just before the company released a poor economic report. In 1996, this action was deemed to be insider trading and he was sentenced to a fine of one million Francs.

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