Paris Fashion Week: strong Louis Vuitton and Alexander McQueen shows

The Zoolander affair may have hijacked Valentino's show in Paris on Tuesday, but as fashion week drew to a close yesterday nothing stood in the way of the strong winter collection from Nicholas Ghesquière, his second at the Louis Vuitton Foundation. It underscored some of the week's trends such as the stress on craft and handwork, particularly pleating and ornate fabrics, narrower coats, trouser suits and a lot of light-reflecting embellishment.

Chez Vuitton, three massive geodesic domes with glossy orange and green seating were erected beside Frank Gehry’s soaring glass and steel building in the Jardin d’Acclimatation for the event and nobody seemed bothered by a tethered drone overhead. Sunlight shone down through the windows on the opening numbers – huge chubby coats and jackets in white or leopard print fake (was it fake?) fur, skinny pants, ankle boots and mini trunk-style bags, gear for a cool city girl in winter. Other coats were sharper cover-ups in navy or banana wool, a brooch glinting at the collar, counterpoints to the boned lingerie dresses in blue, black or white.

Luxury and youth

But this being Vuitton, it was ultimately about luxury and youth and the designer stressed the point with flirty suits of gold tweed, skirts like molten silver and slash-front knits gleaming with sparkle and seductive appeal. It was girly and a little rock’n’roll but with a tough modernity and confidence – trouser suits were lean and narrow in nighttime black or silver satin and some jackets had leg o’mutton sleeves for a strong shoulder line. The finale, a suit that reinterpreted the famous Murakami print in black and white kept the Vuitton codes, literally, in check.

Exquisite collection

At Alexander McQueen’s show in the vaults of the Conciergerie, the ancient prison where Marie Antoinette and thousands of others spent their last days, designer

Sarah Burton

kept her head and sent out an exquisite collection based on the idea of a rose as a symbol of strength and fragility “forever on the brink of dishevelment”.

That meant shapely dresses with appliqué roses, shiny black coats in rose-print jacquard, lace-printed trouser suits and fan-pleated leather skirts the colour of blood. With their bird’s nest hairdos, bee-stung lips and bleached- out faces, the models drove home the sense of decay and fading beauty.