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Ford's models used to ooze sultriness in cocktail clothes that caressed the body. Pilati's collection focused on daywear: tulip-shaped skirts, wide waist-cinching belts and party dresses as cumbersome as topiaries carved out of stiff ruffles.

Only a handful of editors embraced the jarring silhouettes. Most notably, French Vogue's Carine Roitfeld promptly began wearing the exaggerated skirts -- a gesture that should be viewed with some skepticism since her magazine relies on advertising from YSL and because she has a history of supporting fashion oddities such as Max Mara's diaper pants.

"The first season I had nothing to risk," Pilati says. "The first season, I said, 'Go for it.' You have to do what you feel, you know, because you will always regret it if you start from the beginning to do something and you don't because you are scared.

"I thought this might be the only collection I do for Saint Laurent. You never know. You're dealing with an industry . . ." and here he sighs, "Anything can happen."

Pilati's first language is Italian, but he also speaks French and English, all in a rumbling voice, filling the pauses with unprompted laughter instead of simply letting the silences be. Born in Milan, Pilati, 41, has worked with Giorgio Armani, Miuccia Prada and Ford. When he worked on Prada's Miu Miu collection, he says, he learned how to balance novelty with thoughtful design. He was hired away from Prada by Ford, who anointed him as his right-hand man. After Ford left the company, Pilati, for the first time in his career, had sole creative control of a major brand. He credits Ford with helping him develop an international vision, one taking in the global marketplace and not just thinking of the customer and her lifestyle as French, or even European.

Pilati's headquarters is on Paris's swanky Avenue George V. A large room just down the hallway from his office is reserved for fittings. With its high ceilings, wall of mirrors and towering windows that overlook the street, it resembles an idealized Hollywood set of a French atelier.

A lot about Pilati seems to come from Central Casting. His office is small and filled with books on art as well as an enormous volume by Proust. A surfboard hangs above the doorway, evidence of the designer's newest hobby.

On this day, Pilati wears dark pants and a sweater. His once long, wavy hair has been trimmed short like a schoolboy's, but he kept his tidy beard. He looks less obviously like the dandy that he is: a man who wears boutonnieres and ascots. He wore a jeweled skull cap tilted to a jaunty angle at a May black-tie gala. He drinks tea in the late afternoon and he smokes at his desk.

The collections that followed the tulip skirts also failed to generate the enthusiasm and momentum needed to transform a languishing brand into a powerhouse. "The second and third collections people start to have an opinion. The business affect me. The pressure affect me," Pilati says. "Not maybe in a bad way, maybe in a good way. Again I was learning something."

The second collection was inspired by religion and was overtly stuffy, with high, formal collars. "I was really proud of that collection," Pilati says. "I did it because I wanted to thank God for the opportunity to do a second collection."

Another collection was plagued with instances of immolation by flounces. And then there was the spring 2007 romp through the flora. He sent models wobbling down a runway as long as a football field, covered in topsoil and planted with violets. The sight of the teetering young women, their spike heels aerating the soil as they walked, did not give one the impression that a confident -- or kind -- hand was holding the reins. While Ford was accused of ignoring or disrespecting the house's history, Pilati has been charged with worshiping it.

"Everything I've done for the house of Saint Laurent today, I've done because I respect Mr. Saint Laurent," Pilati says. "It is a respect for how much this house has influenced everything that we do today."