Paris couture week reaches creative climax in Margiela, Saab

PARIS – Paris couture week reached a creative climax Wednesday with strong showing from Maison Margiela and Elie Saab.

Here are some of the highlights of the last of the fall-winter 2016 collections.

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MAISON MARGIELA

John Galliano continues to raise the profile of Maison Margiela.

In Wednesday’s ever-creative show, the Gibraltar-born Briton went one step further in stamping the unique brand of Galliano Romanticism on the once-minimalist house.

These styles and artistry have been sorely missed on the couture calendar ever since the designer was deposed from the creative helm of Christian Dior in 2011, when an anti-Semitic rant by him was captured on video.

Abstractions based on Asian styles opened the show in a dropped wrap-around style Chinese red jacket with huge limp tubular arms.

It was, of course, worn with black stripper boots. But this is Galliano: the kinky boots, with purposeful irony, could well have been mistaken for a fisherman’s wading boots — a detail that parodied the note of sensuality with panache.

Styles were eclectic, but held together by the sheer theatricality and exuberance of the soft lines of the silhouette.

Of course, the fashion industry’s model-of-the-moment Anna Cleveland was included in the fashion musing, and deservingly given one of the most archetypal looks. She prowled with signature dramatic confidence down the runway in a Napoleonic hat, with a voluminous 19th-century coat with an exaggerated look of horror.

It prompted many a smile from the front row.

Judging by the maison’s financial buoyancy since last year, the 55-year-old Galliano can proudly boast not only creative success in womenswear but a commercial one as well.

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SONIA RKYIEL FOR LANCOME

Lancome is paying tribute to fashion house Sonia Rykiel with a party to mark its new collaboration on a makeup brand.

At the exclusive Ecole Superieure des Beaux Arts in Paris’ storied Left Bank, the Parisian cosmetic giant is hosting a celebrity-filled event called the Club Saint-Germain party.

Award-winning film director Jacques Audiard, Spanish actress Adriana Ugarte and models including Coco Rocha are among the headlining VIPs.

The event — with stunning and surprising scenography — features a live performance by three internationally-renowned music artists under the artistic direction of French artist Andre.

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ELIE SAAB GOES CLASSIC

Old-school Hollywood glamour was back in vogue at Elie Saab’s fall collection.

It injected the fashion calendar with the most archetypally couture show seen all season.

Saab, like other couture masters, plays with his own rulebook and need not pay heed to the wearable trends of the season.

Split leg, floor length sensuality was the order of the day.

A velvet royal blue evening gown was given a twist, with asymmetrical feather-like detailing at the shoulder and waist.

It complemented a brooding palette of dark and often sheer materials with the signature Saab cinched-waisted hour glass vava-voom silhouettes.

One highlight was a mother and daughter couture ensemble in grey, modelled simultaneously.

Flashes of Art Nouveau patterning were the season’s added ingredient, evoking the graphic sensuality of Gustav Klimt.

The creative musing reached its climax in a traffic-stopping floor-length textured ballgown. It had fashion insiders reaching for their cameras with its blissful couture embroidering of thousands of blue and cream flowers.

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Thomas Adamson can be followed at http://www.twitter.com/ThomasAdamsonAP