Ladylike styles find favour again
Fashion designers' creative appetite is yet to be satisfied. Therefore they set up camps to showcase their creations for next autumn.
Paris fashion week drew to a close on Sunday with designers setting up camp near the City of Light's top tourist attractions to showcase their creations for next fall.
Louis Vuitton planted a transparent tent in a courtyard of the Louvre museum, while Nina Ricci's show in the adjacent Tuileries gardens was held in a tent that had a large opening in the back, giving guests a view of trees shrouded in artificial mist.
Lanvin staged its display in a tent opposite the Eiffel Tower, where waiters greeted guests with fruit-flavoured macaroons.
The day capped off four weeks of international shows that saw a return of ladylike dressing. Major trends included sculpted cocoon coats, full structured sleeves and masculine tailoring such as wide pants.
Hollywood actress Scarlett Johansson sparked a photographer frenzy at the Louis Vuitton show on Sunday, as designer Marc Jacobs took Paris fashion week to its final phase with shimmering, slim outfits.
Jacobs said his collection at Vuitton was a homage to Johannes Vermeer, calling the line "Girl with a monogrammed bag", a play on words on Vermeer's painting and the 2003 film Girl with a Pearl Earring on the Dutch painter, in which Johansson played a main character.
"I thought it was amazing," the actress told reporters after the show in a giant tent in a courtyard of the Louvre museum.
"I thought it was beautiful. And I was really happy to see how wearable everything is," she said, after Jacobs paraded out models in short leather jackets with asymmetric zips. Other girls wore A-line coats and dresses in all shades of blue.
"The colour palette was informed by paintings from Vermeer," Jacobs said after the show. "What we set out to do was to keep a sense of romanticism and a sense of colour but to give them a force and a strength and to keep them modern."
The Vuitton show came at the end of a fashion marathon, which has taken editors and buyers to New York, London, Milan and Paris in past weeks and featured some theatrical shows.
Belgian designer Olivier Theyskens smiled timidly in relief as he won roaring applause for the light silk dresses and dramatic evening gowns he showed in his first collection for Nina Ricci.
Taking over at a famous brand is no easy task for the new designers on Paris catwalks, who have to live up to high expectations and must strike a balance between imposing their own style and remaining faithful to the history of the house.
20070310-lifestyle--fashion2.jpgTheyskens is not the only one facing the challenge. Sweden's Paulo Melim Andersson presented cape-like dresses in a first line for Chloe on Saturday and Norway's Peter Dundas rolled out his third collection for Emanuel Ungaro earlier in the week.
"For my first collection, I didn't really want to open the (colour) palette too much," the soft-spoken Theyskens said after presenting floating grey dresses and long gowns of the kind that have already seduced Hollywood actress Reese Witherspoon.
Theyskens, who came from Rochas after the label stopped its fashion business last year, has had a head start at Ricci.
Even before the official presentation of his first line, Theyskens struck a deal to dress Witherspoon at the awards season, and the actress won much praise for her sleeveless Ricci dress at the Oscars - a clever coup, experts say.
Norwegian Peter Dundas turned his catwalk into a glitzy night club, presenting crystal dresses in his third collection for the Emanuel Ungaro label.
Models in sparkling short dresses and tight, high-waisted trousers paraded to thumping disco sounds, with some partially covering their shimmering outfits with wide-hooded fur coats.
"The collection was a little bit like a celebration of night clubbing," Dundas told reporters after his show.
"I love clubbing. I love seeing all the girls getting dressed up and going out in little slinky T-Shirt dresses, with great dramatic coats on top of it," he said after the show, which also featured skin-tight leather trousers.
"I always liked the idea that (a girl) gets out of the limousine with her motorbike pants," he said.
Dundas is among several new designers who have recently joined a renowned fashion label and are seeking to leave their mark on the house while remaining faithful to its history.
The new faces have no easy task at big labels, experts say. "These designers come into a world that is occupied by the brand," Didier Grumbach, the head of the French fashion federation said.
"There are some messages that belong to the brand. So they cannot express themselves as freely as they can under their own name."
Ungaro was sold in November 2005 by Italian fashion house Salvatore Ferragamo to an investment company backed by US internet entrepreneur Asim Abdullah.
With the change in ownership came a change in creative directors, the third in as many years, and Dundas took over from Frenchman Vincent Darre.
Abdullah said Dundas was starting to apply his own touch to the brand.
"Clearly, Emanuel Ungaro has a very rich DNA and history to its brand. But at the same time, we need to modernise the company," Abdullah said at the show.
"We're looking at Peter to take it to the next step," he said, adding he wanted to move the house forward by strengthening its core women's clothes segment.
"We're going to expand into other areas, but the high-end women's wear is where the brand has traditionally been, and that's an area where we have to be very, very secure. And we want to get back into a leadership position," he said.
Louis Vuitton planted a transparent tent in a courtyard of the Louvre museum, while Nina Ricci's show in the adjacent Tuileries gardens was held in a tent that had a large opening in the back, giving guests a view of trees shrouded in artificial mist.
Lanvin staged its display in a tent opposite the Eiffel Tower, where waiters greeted guests with fruit-flavoured macaroons.
The day capped off four weeks of international shows that saw a return of ladylike dressing. Major trends included sculpted cocoon coats, full structured sleeves and masculine tailoring such as wide pants.
Hollywood actress Scarlett Johansson sparked a photographer frenzy at the Louis Vuitton show on Sunday, as designer Marc Jacobs took Paris fashion week to its final phase with shimmering, slim outfits.
Jacobs said his collection at Vuitton was a homage to Johannes Vermeer, calling the line "Girl with a monogrammed bag", a play on words on Vermeer's painting and the 2003 film Girl with a Pearl Earring on the Dutch painter, in which Johansson played a main character.
"I thought it was amazing," the actress told reporters after the show in a giant tent in a courtyard of the Louvre museum.
"I thought it was beautiful. And I was really happy to see how wearable everything is," she said, after Jacobs paraded out models in short leather jackets with asymmetric zips. Other girls wore A-line coats and dresses in all shades of blue.
"The colour palette was informed by paintings from Vermeer," Jacobs said after the show. "What we set out to do was to keep a sense of romanticism and a sense of colour but to give them a force and a strength and to keep them modern."
The Vuitton show came at the end of a fashion marathon, which has taken editors and buyers to New York, London, Milan and Paris in past weeks and featured some theatrical shows.
Belgian designer Olivier Theyskens smiled timidly in relief as he won roaring applause for the light silk dresses and dramatic evening gowns he showed in his first collection for Nina Ricci.
Taking over at a famous brand is no easy task for the new designers on Paris catwalks, who have to live up to high expectations and must strike a balance between imposing their own style and remaining faithful to the history of the house.
20070310-lifestyle--fashion2.jpgTheyskens is not the only one facing the challenge. Sweden's Paulo Melim Andersson presented cape-like dresses in a first line for Chloe on Saturday and Norway's Peter Dundas rolled out his third collection for Emanuel Ungaro earlier in the week.
"For my first collection, I didn't really want to open the (colour) palette too much," the soft-spoken Theyskens said after presenting floating grey dresses and long gowns of the kind that have already seduced Hollywood actress Reese Witherspoon.
Theyskens, who came from Rochas after the label stopped its fashion business last year, has had a head start at Ricci.
Even before the official presentation of his first line, Theyskens struck a deal to dress Witherspoon at the awards season, and the actress won much praise for her sleeveless Ricci dress at the Oscars - a clever coup, experts say.
Norwegian Peter Dundas turned his catwalk into a glitzy night club, presenting crystal dresses in his third collection for the Emanuel Ungaro label.
Models in sparkling short dresses and tight, high-waisted trousers paraded to thumping disco sounds, with some partially covering their shimmering outfits with wide-hooded fur coats.
"The collection was a little bit like a celebration of night clubbing," Dundas told reporters after his show.
"I love clubbing. I love seeing all the girls getting dressed up and going out in little slinky T-Shirt dresses, with great dramatic coats on top of it," he said after the show, which also featured skin-tight leather trousers.
"I always liked the idea that (a girl) gets out of the limousine with her motorbike pants," he said.
Dundas is among several new designers who have recently joined a renowned fashion label and are seeking to leave their mark on the house while remaining faithful to its history.
The new faces have no easy task at big labels, experts say. "These designers come into a world that is occupied by the brand," Didier Grumbach, the head of the French fashion federation said.
"There are some messages that belong to the brand. So they cannot express themselves as freely as they can under their own name."
Ungaro was sold in November 2005 by Italian fashion house Salvatore Ferragamo to an investment company backed by US internet entrepreneur Asim Abdullah.
With the change in ownership came a change in creative directors, the third in as many years, and Dundas took over from Frenchman Vincent Darre.
Abdullah said Dundas was starting to apply his own touch to the brand.
"Clearly, Emanuel Ungaro has a very rich DNA and history to its brand. But at the same time, we need to modernise the company," Abdullah said at the show.
"We're looking at Peter to take it to the next step," he said, adding he wanted to move the house forward by strengthening its core women's clothes segment.
"We're going to expand into other areas, but the high-end women's wear is where the brand has traditionally been, and that's an area where we have to be very, very secure. And we want to get back into a leadership position," he said.