New York Fashion Week Day Four

A flash of coral, tree-bark prints, sleek tailoring and a T-shirt with one sleeve removed were all I took in of the clothes on stage at the Opening Ceremony show.

But the theatrical performance – powerful, penetrating and discomforting enough to have the fashion audience squirming – is now embedded in my memory.

By asking director Spike Jonze and actor Jonah Hill to create a one-act play, Carol Lim and Humberto Leon, the duo behind the Opening Ceremony brand, achieved the exceptional: something original in fashion presentation.

The satirical storyline brought together a rookie blonde model up from the sticks (Elle Fanning), a world-weary model at the advanced age of 20 (Dree Hemingway) and a neurotic designer whose self-absorbed insecurity was put on petulant display.

The audience alternated between laughing and shifting awkwardly at this parody of a fashion-show preparation. That included an alcoholic stylist (who cut off the T-shirt sleeve as a statement), and a lesson on how to walk the runway by genuine model Karlie Kloss.

Lim and Leon always think outside of the box. But this play, entitled 100 Per Cent Lost Cotton, was a rare and memorable display of imagination.