If Hedi Slimane has, at Saint Laurent at least, made a name for evolving streetwear into demi-couture, then for spring 2014, he showed how those two aesthetics might sit together and work in conjunction.

With a shouty neo-punk soundtrack from LA band The Liars, Slimane seemed to reach back to early 80s New York – to CBGBs, to the Ramones and Blondie - in mannish tailoring, Joan Jett hair and eye make-up, plenty of leather, skinny ties and skinny trousers in both cotton and oilslicked skins. It sat perfectly with the rock chick look he has presented in seasons past.

But at the same time, he developed a counter-riff in sequinned lip prints on a tight and slight minidresses and lame body-con with sculptural proportions that spoke more of the uptown cocktail party circuit of that time too.

The synthesis of both made for a collection that took music as its starting point – as is this designer’s wont – but which worked out from that scene to encompass an entire era. That felt not only new but also like a very natural progression.

In practice, it meant yet more of those cool-kid separates, in biker jackets (cut baggy, as if they were second-hand, but finished immaculately, some lined in zebra print ponyskin), sheer black silk blouses, and sliced, deconstructed le smoking boleros that Slimane’s established fanbase will love immediately.

But Slimane had also looked to the house’s archives, in gold lame cocktail dresses, sequinned dresses striped with sparkles, and a repeated asymmetrical one-shoulder neckline – sometimes slashed but just as often built up in puffed volume, at one point a hyperbolic tulle frill, and all atop a vigorously body-con fit. On one top, a flame print picked out in ritzy sequins seemed both Slimane and Saint Laurent in equal measure.

It was the house’s heritage styled according to the Slimane vision: cut, spliced and printed with geometries inspired by the sketches of artist Guy de Cointet (a French-born, California-based artist - hint hint); rocked up, played down, and worn with plenty of attitude.

The models could have been Debbie Harry or, at the other end of the spectrum, Melanie Griffiths. Or they could have been some latterday bombshell, at home either at a gala or at a gig. They were rockstars and princesses, brash and bourgeois - such was the timelessness, the upwards and downwards convergence, and the over-arching sense of glamorous, slightly counter-cultural cool inherent to these clothes.

That’s of course a type of alchemy for any designer – to create a collection that speaks to women across demographics, scenes, area codes and seasons. And that’s why Slimane's blend for spring was such a masterstroke.

Click the gallery to view every look from the Saint Laurent spring 2014 collection