By SAMANTHA CRITCHELL
NEW YORK — There were no rules of the runway for Nanette Lepore: Stripes were mixed with florals, bright orange and pink blended with gray and beige, and linen was paired with lace.
Lepore was inspired by Picasso for the collection presented Monday as part of New York Fashion Week.
She used a lot of all-over prints, especially on wispy below-the-knee dresses, including an adorable strapless collage-floral sarong and flounce dress. Shorter dresses that seemed like mini-kaftans were called "swimdresses."
Pants were short, too, with exaggerated wide legs but otherwise tailored and ready to go to work. She paired them with a series of one-shoulder tops or a jacket with a bow.
Lepore couldn't decide if one swirl-print number was pants or a dress, so she called it "pants-dress," but from the audience's perspective it looked like a jumpsuit — which is becoming increasingly ubiquitous.
Coats were strong — an olive one with pink embroidery was a strange combination worth checking out.
Like many of her peers, Lepore outfits models in shoes that she also designs. She has a higher-end signature shoe label but she does kicks for Keds, too, and there was one shoe from that collection — a canvas wedge with an ankle strap — that might give espadrilles a run for their money next year.
The words "classic with a modern twist" might very well be the most overused phrase in fashion. But it also may be the only way to describe Oscar de la Renta's spring collection.
De la Renta put on a real show, moving his runway from the Bryant Park tents to a former church on Park Avenue. Instead of a DJ spinning thumping beats, The Polyphonic Spree, a funky choir, provided the background music. And there were Victoria Beckham and tennis star Roger Federer in the front row. (When Federer took his seat next to Vogue editor in chief Anna Wintour, the rest of the crowd gave him a round of applause for his latest U.S. Open championship.)
Each season, de la Renta turns out a mix of gowns, suits and chic little dresses for his uptown customer. This time, prints featured leaf designs and wood carvings, beads were crafted into flowers and the palette included many earthy neutrals. Even the grand finale dress, with a giant black feather tucked into the black waistband and a full ballskirt, had a certain restraint.
De la Renta dresses the black-tie set, and the offerings for them ranged from a red column gown to a fitted gold tulle gown with mirrored beads all over it. For cocktail parties, there was a bubble-hem strapless dress in an ikat print that mimicked jewels in deep green, ruby and yellow. (Ikat prints, based on a weaving technique native to Uzbekistan, have become somewhat of a staple in de la Renta's collections.)
Carolina Herrera showed a spring collection on Monday that went back to her South American roots. One gown was quintessential Herrera: a shirtdress gown with tiers of ruffles on the skirt in a coral-based floral print.
While the designer took her bow at New York Fashion Week in a chic slim skirt and crisp blouse — as she often does — one could easily picture her in the dress that was equal parts romantic and serious. There's nothing girlie about Herrera or her clothes.
"Every dress had an important powerful detail," said Suze Yalof Schwartz, fashion editor at large for Glamour. "Finally there's a designer who designs clothes that look as expensive as they are."
Herrera adorned dresses with feathers, jet beads and sequins arranged in floral patterns.
"I would throw away every single item in my wardrobe for that one white shift dress with the feathers and black beading," Yalof Schwartz said.
Other outstanding dresses were a slipdress with a hand-painted floral design in rose that was covered by a black sheer overlay, and the daytime outfits of a red floral-print dress with blue grosgrain ribbon detail and a suede sheath dress with a white canvas collar decorated with a single white flower.
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