Fashion: The Best Moments From Paris to Milan?

Best ’80s Revival

Duran Duran performed at Versace ’s after-party, and the fashion pack got down. Anna Dello Russo wore a tutu, Donatella boogied in a corset, and even those usually caught scowling front-row just let loose.


Best 'Lost' Reference

The Chanel team has transformed Paris’ Grand Palais into everything from Versailles to the Arctic— for this season’s show , it was an island covered in volcanic ash. Dry-ice smoke and major models stepped out from behind massive logoed drawbridges at both ends of the wooden runway.


Best Gimmick

Sticking Kate Moss on the Louis Vuitton runway with a smoking cigarette was awesome. Forget the clothes and the bags and the shoes—sometimes we just want a show that makes us go “Oh my god!”


Best Star Power

Yes, Miu Miu was full of hot young starlets, but Giorgio Armani packed in legends. Prince and Tina Turner both sat front row at the AW11 show in Milan.


Best Onesie

In a season full of jumpsuits, Stella McCartney’s polka-dot, peplum version took the cake. It was sweet but sexy and structured enough to work on a woman lacking Arizona Muse’s perfect figure.


Best Ink

Brazilian model Viviane Orth showed off her star of David tattoo at the tiny John Galliano presentation on Avenue Foch.


Best Sing-Your-Heart-Out Moment

Mary J. Blige sang “Stairway to Heaven” at Michael Kors’ 30th-anniversary dinner and celebration at the American Embassy in Paris just two weeks after Bette Midler sang to him backstage in New York City. Apparently 30 really is the new 20 for Kors.


Best Totally Nonsensical Trend

Every model at Prada —whether she held a clutch, a duffel, or a hobo—tucked her bag under her arm with no regard for its logically placed handles. The trend continued onto Paris catwalks, so start working out those arm muscles. (The tight, cropped elbow-length capelet is a close second.)


Best Runway

Vivienne Westwood’s gold glitter runway matched the models’ heels. Also, it was covered in gold confetti by the end, proving that sometimes more is better.


Best Shoes

There are those who love Prada’s trompe l’oeil Maryjane boots and those who don’t—so we award them best accessory because they’ll spawn more conversation in a season than most shoes will in a lifetime.


Best Entrance

Nina Ricci’s AW show was in the Tuileries, but in the evening, once the gardens closed, so they lined a path with candles from the Place de la Concorde all the way into the tent—it was magical.


Best Disappearing Act

Christophe Decarnin failed to pop his head out at the end of the Balmain show at Le Grand Hotel sending everyone into a flurry of rumors about mental hospitals, rehab, and just plain exhaustion. Regardless of what really happened, he was seen out and about in Paris the next night.


Best Use of Corsetry

Though waists were cinched on runways from New York to Paris, Christopher Kane’s boned corsets at Versus were our favorite. They didn’t lace, they weren’t leather, and they didn’t actually show any skin, but they look sexy and, shockingly, quite comfortable.


Best Stuck-in-Our-Heads Song

“In the Hall of the Mountain King” played throughout Vanessa Bruno’s AW11 show in the Palais de Tokyo. It took several listenings of “Teenage Dream” to get it out of our heads.


Best Ubiquitous Model

Joan Smalls is neither new nor vintage, but she sure is gorgeous. The Puerto Rican model popped up on almost every runway—from Moschino and Pucci to Stella and Jean Paul Gaultier—and we never tired of seeing her.


Best 'Zoolander' Moment

Nicola Formichetti’s Thierry Mugler show was so over the top, so everything you want from a French fashion show, and so bursting with energy that we couldn’t help but think it’d make a perfect scene in Zoolander II. (And we mean that as a compliment.)


Best Winter White

While wearing white in the winter can be dangerous—there’s slush and rain and snow banks to navigate—it can also be gorgeous. Though plenty of designers toyed with the trend, none executed it as beautifully as Stefano Pilati. The final look of his collection for Yves Saint Laurent is a winter dream.


Best Bet for Kate Middleton

Just two days after The Times of London reported that Sarah Burton was most definitely making an Alexander McQueen wedding dress for Kate Middleton and both the royal family and the design house issued denials, the designer sent out a handful of breathtaking floor-length white dresses. No wonder the betting odds of Middleton’s choosing McQueen shot up to 1 in 20.

(elle.com)