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Today, 08 November 2009

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Yesterday, 07 November 2009

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Christian Lacroix toned down his usual flamboyance in his autumn-winter collection on Wednesday, showing refined clothes which immediately looked more wearable than his cutting-edge couture.

He used a lighter hand on detail, so for once there were not too many things crying out for attention, and there was more overlap, with some fabrics and shapes emerging as clear favourites for next season.

A fine wool treated to look like wrinkled elephant skin was the first star on the catwalk. He used it for his opening number, a pure white winter coat with a dramatic upturned chalice neckline and outsize sleeves cropped at the elbow, the rest of the arm enveloped in a black feather gauntlet.

The same temptingly tactile textured fabric was turned into a sharply-tailored jacket in fuschia set off against a slithery white satin skirt, with origami folds in front standing out slightly from the waist.

Striking prints were leitmotifs in the collection. A bold harlequin print with diamonds in purple, orange, lime and acid yellow in duchesse satin was turned into a puffball mini skirt and off-the-shoulder ruffled dress, while devore velvet in ruby, green and blue was printed for a "stained glass" effect but looked hand-painted.

Cabbage rose sleeves and bows adorned the grander evening gowns, while more fragile frocks had feather embroidered sleeves or even light-as-air ostrich feather capes thrown over the shoulders.

'Austere but sumptuous'

Riccardo Tisci at Givenchy presented an austere, but sumptuous collection on Wednesday evening, with lots of ruching and flounces, dripping with giant crystals and passementerie and an elongated, slim silhouette.

Billowing sleeves and strangulating high collars or floppy neck ties all spelled 18th century aristocratic decadence. Ruffles even traced the shoulder lines of shirts with dickeys which were elaborately flounced and pleated.

Clear crystals gave a lift to silky blouses, while black stones set in Spanish-style passementerie adorned coats in light colours.

For his own label earlier in the day Karl Lagerfeld showed long-line close-fitting jackets with stiff pleats jutting out from below the hips.

His alternative look was maxi-length high-waisted skirts, shown with sharp white shirts and bows at the neck.

Asked if he was predicting a return of longer hemlines, he declared: "I don't believe in only one skirt length. Today this is the expression, the attitude, the looks that give the modernity. It can be a longer skirt, a shorter skirt, a mini skirt and it can be pants. You cannot make headlines with only hem lengths, there has to be a little more."

AFP