New York Fashion Week Day Three City-smart tailoring, neutral colours with black, white and a drop of wine red – Victoria Beckham’s New York show for Summer 2015 proved that she means business. Even the shoes – a new departure ­­– were hefty or flat, ready for taking life in one big stride. “I’m opening […]

New York Fashion Week Day Three “Parole! Parole!” blared the great Italian song from the 1970s, as Diane von Furstenberg sashayed down the runway, putting in the shade even a smiling Naomi Campbell wearing a white baby-doll dress splattered with colour. But there was no shade in this sun-drenched DVF collection, where the golden era of […]

“There is always an element of the 1970s with me, but it has to be relevant to now,” said Derek Lam, after sending out high-class versions of suede and patchwork in painterly colours like lavender and turquoise. The designer may have had Joni Mitchell’s 1974 ‘Help Me’ on the soundtrack, but he did not need any […]

New York Fashion Week Day Three. Music from Black Orpheus transported Midtown New York to the favelas of Brazil. But this is where the connection between the Thakoon show and the compelling and sensual 1959 movie ended. The Thai-American designer told this season’s story backstage when he said, “exotic through the eyes of a tourist”. There were mostly pale […]

New York Fashion Week Day Two.   “Undone – and very sensual,” said Joseph Altuzarra to sum up his powerful collection that took the prim, womanly look of the early 1960s and had it literally undone. To the music from the 1968 movie Rosemary’s Baby, the models walked out in pretty pink gingham checks – slim dresses or […]

New York Fashion Week Day Two. For a second season Prabal Gurung turned to his ethnic origins. But this time, it was his childhood memories of Nepal – especially spring beneath the snow-covered peaks of the Himalayas – that whetted his fashion appetite. “Vibrant lush hillsides dotted with wild roses and rhododendrons,” said Prabal, explaining the […]

New York Fashion Week Day Two   “I loved it,” said Padma Lakshmi, wearing a slip of a blue silk dress, as she hugged Ralph Rucci after his exceptional collection. The designer, whose coterie of adoring clients filled his book-laden, glass-fronted studio, deserves to be labelled ‘American Fashion’s National Treasure’. For his clothes are the […]

New York Fashion Week Day Two   Rihanna was in the front row taping her tomato-red platform shoes, her blue Alexander Wang outfit rising so high up her bronzed legs that the hem was not too far from her matching hat. And the music artist was one of the first to jump up as her favourite […]

Lacoste and Dion Lee at New York Fashion Week Day Two   Lacoste sailed into American fashion territory in a hyper-modern way. The French sports company was showing its male/female range at the New York collections. Techno fabrics, angular lines and geometric shapes added up to twenty-first-century style – and won the race to take sportswear […]

New York Fashion Week Day One   Coach is taking the fast lane to fashion. Designer Stuart Vevers took the super-cool Route 66, using a collaboration with Californian artist-animator Gary Baseman, who produced little creatures to illuminate fabrics and dress up Coach’s famous bags. It reminded me of Japanese designer Takashi Murakami’s collaboration with Louis Vuitton, […]