Glamour sweeps onto Fashion Week runways

J. Mendel
Designer Gilles Mendel was striving for a look of old-fashioned elegance and polish to then propel into the present, he explained in his notes.

He succeeded — and he made it look easy.

The wild-type mink kimono coat, kept close to the body with a satin trenchcoat belt tied in an obi, set the tone that this line would be luxurious but not the slightest bit fussy. A black satin blouse with chiffon panels, worn with a long black pencil skirt, and a black-and-white tweed minidress, also with the obi sash, were the confirmation.

For evening, there was a stunning black chiffon and silver lame gown with jet crystals on the bodice and fur cap sleeves. For those who are not fans of fur, a black satin gown with an asymmetrical neckline, oversized sequin pocket and gathered sleeves was equally noteworthy.

The front row did have some potential celebrity shoppers, including Celine Dion, who wears J. Mendel in her Las Vegas stage show, Natasha Richardson, Cynthia Nixon and Piper Perabo.

Linda Fargo, women’s fashion director at luxury department store Bergdorf Goodman, raved over designer Gilles Mendel’s “classic chic French sensibility.”

“It was sensual, yet there was an aggressive spirit,” Fargo said.

Anna Sui
There’s always a familiarity to Anna Sui’s designs; you know they’ll be bouncy and playful. In this case, reliability is a good thing.

Fashion is so often about the newest, hottest thing, but being able to count on Sui to produce clothes that are both fun and fashionable is actually refreshing.

Wednesday night, she presented her latest take on hippie chic, including loose minidresses in kitschy prints, such as one that looked like a newspaper and another one covered in safety pins; a few even had tassels at the hem. Only Sui could get away with that.

She did use the popular palette for fall — brown, black, gray, purple and metallics.

She opened with a cool pewter parka with bubblelike smocking, and the next few models wore ski-themed outfits, even black ski pants with stirrups. (Sui’s pal, Marc Jacobs, also had stirrups on some of his pants this week, but his were subtle. These were not.)

Models also wore black fur hats that appeared to mimic the hairstyle of rocker Joan Jett, who sat in the front row.

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