The four-week Paris prêt-à-porter season concluded on Sunday with Saint Laurent Rive Gauche show. Stefano Pilati presented his second collection since replacing Tom Ford last year as the designer of the YSL couture house.
The Italian designer kept on Saint Laurent’s spirit of combined elegance and oddness, presenting complex and imaginative clothes. The collection featured a mix of winter and summer, and hard lines with soft fabrics, including jackets with great square shoulders, strangled waists and sprite ruffled peplums teamed with straight skirts, high -collared belted jackets and straight mid-calf skirts with a single flounce at the hem, tulip and puffball skirts, angular coats and jackets sliced into panels and put back together using blanket stitching, frilly apron dresses in white organdy and pastel, and chiffon draped gowns.
But while many editors praised Pilati’s creativity, many buyers expressed concern that such look would be hard to sell. However, in December Robert Polet, chief executive of the Gucci Group that owns Yves Saint Laurent, said he expected it would take a while for the brand to become profitable, analogous to its sister labels, Alexander McQueen, Balenciaga and Stella McCartney, and he was ready to wait.
Italian fashion veteran Valentino, who has been dressing women for the red carpet for 45 years, added a splash of modern style for the youth market at the Paris prêt-à-porter autumn/winter 2005-6 season with a military-nautical inspired collection which included well-tailored, cashmere capes and matelote trousers in red, black and cream, fitted, short jackets with peaked lapels, in tweed, tan leather and sheepskin or olive and tan velvet, slightly flared tight-fitting corduroy trousers with back pockets made of python, crocodile or gold leather, pencil thin skirts, and shirtwaist dress.
Nevertheless, Valentino remained consistent with his image of a proficient creator of glamour and chic, and offered a range of glamorous gowns embellished with fur or lace ruffles, leather jeans with jeweled back pockets, and fur or ostrich feather gilets worn over silk and lace blouses.
"My ultimate goal is always the same: to try to make a woman beautiful, sexy, glamorous," the designer told AP.
Alber Elbaz , who joined Lanvin in 2002, showcased elegant tailored jackets with sharp shoulders, trenchcoats flared out from the waist and skirts billowed around the hips.
Marc Jacobs for Louis Vuitton offered a range of unique garments, playing with unusual shapes and volumes and using interesting fabrics and garment detailing.
According to Vogue editor-at-large Andre Leon Talley, the strongest items for next winter were sleek coats and lavish accessories.
"There's a change in the air in fashion," he told Reuters. "I think it's a new kind of romanticism. The change will happen here in Paris, with three or four individual strong design houses or designers."