A new rigueur shall be established in the cold season fashion trends in contrast with the ludic and poetic spirit in the spring/summer collections.
If in the past season designers presented the woman as a creative and sophisticated being who loves art and to have fun, who is full of colour and wrapped up in fluid fabrics, this season, designers created her a real couture armour with serious architectural forms, hard to ignore. We take part in a major change, totally unexpected. Even if designers drop the last year’s overlaying, we still find an exaggerate volume, especially in the upper part of the outfit (the shoulders) provided by ingenuous cuts or padded, thick fabrics. The image obtained is very powerful, almost frightening. The new role of the woman is to impress and that is why designers revisited and reused all the ingredients of the 80’s wardrobe (oversized shoulders in Fendi, masculine costumes in Karl Lagerfeld, rigid costumes in Prada). The designers’ preoccupation to find new, modern work uniforms generated also the apparition of a new “secretary” look, reflected by rigid costumes or shirts combined with conic skirts, in which the sharp contours are soften by fluid fabrics (silk shirts) or thick lace (Prada).
Accessories play an important role this season. The accent lies on footwear.
The chromatic palette is dominated by black, with accents of intense purple, platinised gold and silver, emerald green, beige and optic white.

Architectonic

“I design a dress the same way I build a house” declares Gian Franco Ferre. The strongest current of the season is meant to continue designers’ exploration of other creative handcrafts. After painting, they choose architecture. This is a perfect theme, especially when it comes to volumes, present in the collections of Stefano Pilati for Yves Saint Laurent, Viktor&Rolf or Maison Martin Margiela. Francisco Costa for Calvin Klein introduces elements of Zaha Hadid’s architecture via laser cut coats and linen vests. Balenciaga collection goes even further and adds a futuristic touch to the entire “architectonic” current by imaging real complicated constructions with savant cuts carried out in the spirit of Cristobal Balenciaga.
Just like in architecture, we assist to a play of volumes and colours. Martin Margiela, even if he prefers to put aside the spring/summer oversized shoulders, focuses on the upper part of the outfit, especially on the collar, which he radically moved or recreated by turning to a technique reminding of origami. The couple Viktor&Rolf introduces “tri-dimensional” elements (letters, graphics) applied on most of the collection outfits, and for Karl Lagerfeld, everything is about precision and proportion, just like in architecture. Stefano Pilati plays with the “trompe l’oeil” effect in silver-grey and black silk tunic dresses. Accessories describe perfectly too, the new obsession of designers. At Lanvin, the jewels were created out of mirror-cut cubes reminding of the New York sky-scrapers, hexagonal crystal plates were mounted on the Givenchy dresses, and shoes become a real “architectonic” statement. Prada creates its shoes of bi-coloured stripes, thus creating an optical illusion, while, at the same time, re-designing the heel – which is much more biased towards interior, almost surreal as style, but still easy to wear. Platforms are excessively used as a way to make the figure taller, but also to counter balance the shoulders’ impressive broadness. The chromatic palette is sober and cold, with accents of intense purple or platinised gold and silver (in accessories).

Masculine

Another major theme that was declined in many collections is the “new costume”, designers bringing homage to the cult-movie of the 80’s - “Working Girl”. The strive for succeeding in fields traditionally considered to belong strictly to men (business, real estate, stock exchange) and the fight for the same rights as men, forced women to improvise a new “working” uniform. To this purpose they turned to men suits, with impressive shoulders (suggesting strength), to straight pants; they reduced accessories to the minimum and they did the same with all elements that could have suggested frivolity. All this transformation was brought on the cold season’s catwalks by designers in the nature of rigid linen costumes, oversized shoulder jackets in Fendi, shirts with cuffs and collar in contrasting colours in Giorgio Armani, cigarette pants, but with waist pleats (extremely like 80’s) in Narciso Rodriguez, the totally black look and padded jackets with patent-leather wide belts in Louis Vuitton and the classic gabardine trench-coats signed by Burberry.
Fabrics with a harsh aspect – linen texture – and the sober palette created mostly of black and sad tones of gray, with strong accents of optic white also help in the creation of a new look that is extremely serious and impressive.
Accessories are inspired from the same source: the men wardrobe. Long black or gray socks, flat-shaped string shoes or high platform boots (Yves Saint Laurent) and flat-shaped bags in which only a few paper sheets fit in, also talk of what women seem to need nowadays: to impose and to dominate.

New luxury

In all the austerity of this season there is still a touch of absolute luxury. Regardless if we talk about fabrics (precious fur in Dior and Lanvin, silk satin in Lanvin, muslin in Chloe, cashmere in Celine), accessories (jewellery cascade in Givenchy and oversized jewelleries in Lanvin) or embroidery (embroidered tunics in Kenzo or dresses with applications in Chloe), the fall/winter season proposes a new approach of the luxury idea, a luxury that is not as obvious as in the past (suggested by gold, strips, shiny or precious stones) but, paradoxically, much more precious. Complicated cut details, hidden in Versace clothes, thousands of handmade pleats in Givenchy, silk tulle layers on Burberry trench-coats, silk skirts embroidered with feathers in Ralph Lauren, dresses with ornamental laser cutting-outs, well, the whole study and the entire time invested in the execution is expensive, as “time is money”.
John Galliano imagines for Dior a “grande damme bourgeoise”, with dresses cut over the knee and precious fur coats with dropped shoulders, and Alber Elbaz genially mixes austerity with luxury in the most appreciated collection of the season by proposing dresses of fine veil stripes entirely embroidered with golden sequins, reminding of the cabaret costumes. Ivana Omazic lays over the sand-glass figure of the 50’s the smooth silk veil, thus obtaining a fluid figure, and Sonia Rykiel creates color effect by hand painting the silk and tulle evening dresses.
The chromatic palette is not at all excessive. There are pastels at Dior and Celine, a deep blue at Jose Castro and John Galliano (combined with orange) and emerald green at Miu Miu.
Accessories are entirely made of materials as precious as the ones in the clothes - piton, crocodile and ostrich – or of unexpected combinations – wood and patent-leather in Marni. 

Ethno Trip

Fashion will always act a bit as a “travel agency”, trying to discover each season the most interesting, special and unexpected destination. If India awoke the interest of designers in the spring/summer season, Scotland, Ukraine and Peru visas were applied on the fashion passport for the cold season. Paris is also on list with a re-memorizing full of poetry and nostalgia in Saint-Germain-des-Pres signed by Paul Smith.

Scotland is quoted by Ralph Lauren who signs jackets with a tartan shawl collar and simple hats heaped with feathers imagined by Philip Treacy. The tartan’s pattern was printed on silk dresses, but also on stockings in D&G, and a modern variant of the kilt with a wide belt is to be found in Dsquared collection.
Frida Giannini created for Gucci a collection extremely rich in details (jewelleries, embroideries and prints) a mixture of chic with folklore, and Roberto Cavalli has the 19th century Peru as a main source of inspiration. A Latin spirit is to be found in the Chloe collection also, with extremely gypsy embroideries, while AF Vandervorst interprets the Mormons’ dressing codes.
The practical and comfortable bag, metallic plates belts, high boots (in Gucci), Aztec drawings printed by Louise Gordon on blouses by padding, “western” shirts and feather skirts (in Ralph Lauren) suggest the image of an unusual globe trotter, for whom is apparently impossible to give up luxury, but still, who tries to maintain the comfort of a travel outfit.

Iron Lady

This season, designers’ preocupation to find new, modern working uniforms generated an “executive lady” look. Thus, it resulted a retro image reminding of the Iron Lady, Margaret Thatcher, a mix of subtle Parisian chic with the Savile Row specific tailoring.
High-waisted skirts are combined with rigorous masculine shirts (AF Vandervorst) or with silk shirts closed at the neck by big, elegant bows (DSquared), linen vests (Nina Ricci) or cloak coats (Fendi) are overlay simple and tight dresses (Prada). Another important element is the dress cut over the knee and girded with a man belt. 
The rigid lines are softened by fluid fabrics such as silk or thick lace (Prada).
The classic high heel shoe or the pointed ballerina shoes (Giorgio Armani) together with no handle bags complete this “iron lady” image.

In

Black
Platform shoes
Opaque tights
Oversized
Fantasy jewelleries
Neoprene
Tartan
Men belts
Small prints
“Architectural” heels
Soft leather boots
Laser embroideries
Oversized-shoulders jacket
Bow blouses
Thick lace skirt
Patchwork
Shawls  
Out

Neon colours
Baggy dresses
Mini
Thin heels
Boho Chic
XXL prints
Leopard print
Fringes
English embroidery

Material realized by Ovidiu Buta, fashion editor, P&G Beauty consultant.