Alexander McQueen Catwalk Fashion Show London Womenswear FW2016

Here was another transporting and hyper-feminine collection from Sarah Burton for Alexander McQueen. Dreamy gauzy dresses in knits as fine as cobwebs; tuberose flowers hand-painted on leather coats and corsets, and feathered skirts made of ostrich plumes that had been lacquered to give them a brooding aspect. The designer decorated her clothes and accessories with talismans and surreal symbols, including pocket watches, butterflies, horseshoes, lips and eyes.

The show opened with mannish tailored coats with an extra lapel dripping, as if in a Dalí painting, over the shoulder, forming an offbeat sash.

By contrast, the frothy dresses, ruffles spilling off of shoulders or peeling off the body to reveal lace bras and camisoles, were striking in their delicacy. The show climaxed with tulle gowns and capes gleaming with shooting stars or silvery moons — and then two of the most elaborate bed jackets you will ever see, quilted like a duvet and covered with dense floral embroideries.

Marc Jacobs Catwalk Fashion Show NYC Womenswear FW2016

Marc Jacobs showed his extravaganza of fashion-noir on a stark white set to the sound of single chimed notes by Japanese musician Keiji Haino. Darkness ruled, but with an underlying sweetness. The models’ eyes and lips were black. The clothes were dark, wondrous, inventive, eccentric pilings of tweeds, furs, silks, and endless decoration, Victoriana meets Goth meets Biker Chic meets Varsity Chic meets Red Carpet meets Violet Incredible and countless other girls of Jacobs’ runways past. Cats, rats, cherubs and ballerinas got acquainted on prints, a giant raven took up residence on the back of a jacket and a lady named Gaga walked the show.

Proenza Schouler Catwalk Fashion Show NYC Womenswear FW2016

Program notes the Proenza Schouler collection cited American art of the Sixties and Seventies as an influence. The fall collection, the notes read, would explore “notions of control and release.” In terms of craft and the technical aspect of making clothes, that meant experimentation with cut and silhouette — when to hug the body, when to let loose with fabric, how to expose skin while avoiding vulgarity and cliché.

Two silhouettes anchored the lineup. Tailored looks featured long jackets, their shapeliness achieved via twisting of the fabrics and asymmetric closures, worn over low-slung, wide pants in fluid fabrics. Dresses kept close to the body on top, releasing into languid skirts. Either way, lacing figured prominently, for both decoration and function.

Michael Kors Catwalk Fashion Show NYC Womenswear FW2016

Micheal Kors’ show was all about function made special and chic — coats (and more coats), sweaters, pants and skirts. How everyday can it be? Kors opened with the basics — peacoat, white blouse, pullover and jeans, but the jeans happened to be feathered from the knees down. Camel made it onto the runway in a shawl-collared coat — a floral mink, worn over a sweater and cropped pant. Other coats got abundant fur collars or were cut in glistening floral brocades. An officer’s coat was sashed in mink. Another simple pleasure, knitted cashmere, came in a charcoal sweater-and-skirt duet that got the reality diva treatment with feathers. Kors kept his shapes from classic to retro.

Rodarte Catwalk Fashion Show New York Womenswear Fw2016

The Mulleavy-sisters wanted to tell a San Francisco story for their fall Rodarte-show. Their collection was an ode to Art Nouveau romance inspired by music posters and the genre’s crafty, gypsy-nymph decoration and witchy fantasy.

Slim, tea-length dresses sectioned into collagelike panels of hand-beaded and hand-painted guipure lace with floral and bird accents were dreamy examples of the designers’ imaginative eveningwear with a homespun touch. Perhaps taking a cue from Scott McKenzie, these San Francisco nouveau fairies were sure to wear flowers in their hair. Other pretty dresses featured a single sleeve with bodices and skirts traced in pink, black and burgundy or pink ruffles.

The daydream was interrupted by clunky ruffled leather pieces (jackets, belts, gloves); garishly colored long-haired goat jackets, and boots that stretched up the calf in cutouts and brown ruffles.

Sies Marjan Catwalk Fashion Show NYC Womenswear FW2016

Dutch designer Sander Lak was the talk of town yesterday in New York. His fresh and relaxed debut-collection – after working for years as headdesigner at Dries van Noten and – was a welcome change of style between all the heavy, furry and layered styff people had been watching over the past days. The name Sies Marjan is a combination of his parents’ given names. The Dries influence was notable, most obviously on his familiar use of color combinations: warm pastels offset by natural tones. The freshness was in the more urban, utilitarian hand.

Lak sent out a beautiful wispy silk floral mid-length dress with a twisted cutout detail at the bodice, followed by a cargo pant and tunic version. But it was the Impressionist-printed jacket and matching wrap skirt, adorned by a fur stole worn like a slouchy backpack, that set the tone.

A disheveled button-down shirt, with oversize trousers was next-generation chic. Lak also paired languid tiered knits or big imperfect-ruffled blouses with diaphanous skirts, and showed trench coats that hung from the models’ backs on halter straps. It was all very, very cool.

3.1 Phillip Lim Catwalk Fashion Show NYC Womenswear FW2016

Phillip Lim did a lot with practical sportswear, elevating simple pieces, such as A-line minis, shifts and boyish trousers with a bit retro plaids — micro and macro — in sour shades of green, rust and brown. The beginning of the show had a neo-rockabilly attitude cross-pollinated with the unusual sporty Zen of quilted nylon puffers with kimono trims and flat, hardy sandals.

It was a thoughtful collection, full of left-of-center ideas that worked. Some of the best looks fused utility and romance, such as a series of Army green items, including cargo pants with patchwork-velvet panels and an oversize parka with a fur hood, slashed elbows and orange embroidery. Lim also joined in the season’s velvet renaissance, with a burnt-orange velvet suit, a fitted navy motor jacket with leather sleeves and velvet booties, some of which had a contrasting silver toe.

Tommy Hilfiger Catwalk Fashion Show NYC Womenswear FW2016

Tommy Hilfiger hit the deck by transforming the Park Avenue Armory into the T.H. Atlantic, a massive vessel leaving no nautical motif out to sea in his fall collection. Set up like a giant, early 20th-century passenger liner under a starry night sky with VIPs seated on the deck, the show was a Tommy Hilfiger theme park. The takes on admiral jackets, stripes, sailor pants and tops and Thirties-era printed silk dresses with Peter Pan and sailor collars were executed with a high level of polish.

Victoria Beckham Catwalk Fashion Show NYC Womenswear Fw2016

Victoria Beckham’s idea for fall 2016 was to make the bustier appropriate for day She cut it in unexpected materials like Prince of Wales check with a bright waxed thread stitched through it and in thick, spongy houndstooth jacquards, both with cutouts sliced below the bustline. These fabrics aren’t necessarily designed to hug a woman’s curves, but she can also opt for the body-con ribbed knit pieces (solids and striped) that Beckham layered over each other to achieve a similarly curvy effect.

To balance that, she also experimented with volume, sending out bubble skirts and others that flared generously to below the knee over flat shoes. Outerwear was strong: Softly structured clutch coats with fringe detailing at the hem shared the runway with more sartorially, sharply tailored numbers in menswear checks.

Public School Catwalk Fashion Show NYC Womenswear FW2016

While New York was trying to survive the cold, harsh weather in aggressively styled, street-influenced layers, it could not foresee that this also echoed in Dao-Yi Chow and Maxwell Osborne’s fall collection of Public School. That meant their compilations of oversize, athletic outerwear, sweeping tailoring and utility gear is relevant and resonating in the streets of today. It also meant the idea is not so new. Chow and Osborne weren’t static about it, though. They kept things fresh with a few bold fuchsia and rust combinations to jolt all the abundance of black, and worked in knit coats and big jeans with raw, fringed finishes that brought a worked-on hand to the lineup. The rugged shearlings looked cool and perfect for todays weather.

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