In the beautiful location of the Cercle Interallyé, a prestigious private members-only club in the heart of Paris, Requiem showed a collection almost entirely in white. Sampling couture details from seemingly long forgotten days, they tried to translate an old school elegance into our modern world. It  was a collection that was very focused on early evening and late day wear. Especially the more sober pieces would make any woman happy, either for her lunch appointment uptown or to wear for a business meeting in the city.

Haute Couture presentations from Chanel used to be held indoors in the salon of the rue Cambon. These days with the couple of thousand guests, this would be rather impractical. Karl Lagerfeld seems to have thought, well if the prophet doesn’t come to the mountain, the mountain has to come to the prophet. As he reconstructed the façade of the famous maison in the rue Cambon inside the Grand Palais. “Our house, in the middle of our street…”, started bursting out the loudspeakers while the first of the models came onto the runway. The audience might have added, our city, our Paris, our Karl, our love affair with fashion.

In a restrained color palette of blacks, greys and whites and spots of pink, Karl showed another, stunningly beautiful take on Chanel’s famous house codes, but more so he showed an hommage to Paris, as the capital of Fashion. An array of carefreeness came in traditional tweed jackets, this year a bit more classically cut, than in the previous seasons and in evening wear that included cascades of chiffon with an overdose of camelias. Never frilly, never vulgar. Just perfect!

Elie Saab, the master of the red carpet, showed a more sober collection. He still references all the colors of the rainbow, but this time he must have placed a smaller order at Swarovski. For “daywear” he showed an array of silk pant suits with ruffled shoulders or tops with ruffles in the front. For evening it was basically a lot of chiffon dresses, some of which were super short in the front. I am eager to see which ones will be worn by whom at the next big awards ceremony.

Imagine Princess Leia meets Parisian chic. An homage to the city of light, love and everything else that make us smile. While Chanel‘s declaration of love was more Rive Droite and mondaine, under Marc Jacobs‘s direction Louis Vuitton’s take on it was more Belleville, Piaf, the nightclubs of the 40s. Bohemian details like bangles, fabric mixes, bells, whistles and beads combined with a palette of warm colors and dark gold, seems to be a declaration of war against the cold climate, we stumbled into. Forget about everything and enjoy! or as the French would say: “Allez, venez Milord, s’assoir à ma table, il fait si froid dehors, ici c’est comfortable.”

Bravo, Alber! Bravissimo! Israeli born designer Alber Elbaz never seems to tire. He shows a more beautiful collection every season. This time however, it was just beyond breathtaking. The collection started with deux pièces, that showed off his capability of fabric manipulation. Forced drapings, either on the shoulder or on the hips with more sober skirts or pants meant an explosion of volume. Especially the asymetric tops and dresses possessed a very rare quality: while being absolutely breathtaking on their own, Lanvin’s collection always remains about the woman. With all the conceptual work that must have gone into dreaming up such a collection, it never became to sober. As the tune changed and a wacky psychedelic leopard print dress started the eveningwear section, it became a feast of glam and glitter with beaded details everywhere. This is the collection of somebody, who is both a real master tailor and a designer with an incredible eye.

- René Horak

images by René Horak and via style.com