Louis Vuitton and Lanvin: Activating desire

With Edith Piaf - that most visceral of Parisian singers - on the soundtrack and fashion channeled from every species of bird feather, animal pattern, reptile skin and ethnic inspiration, the Louis Vuitton show made a bold statement at the Paris summer 2009 collections.

Later in the closing day of the season, Lanvin used strong color on dresses, caressing the body to re-activate fashion desire.

"It's not Africa, it's not anywhere - it's all about Paris," said the Louis Vuitton designer Marc Jacobs backstage, although you could have knocked down with a parakeet green feathered skirt most of the audience, who saw tribal diversity in the totems on shoes, in the carved wooden earrings, in the bags with leopard spots melded with the house logos and in the plumes of a brief dress.

Maybe Piaf's soulful French spirit melded with Josephine Baker's innocent Africana in the fertile mind of Jacobs. But whatever his inspirations, this was a cracking good show, which caught the season's African vibe and produced for Vuitton not just stunning accessories - each in a similar spirit but totally individual. It also created a wardrobe of classic-and-more clothes, bringing back soft, easy pants, marked with polka dots, while the abandoned jacket had many new incarnations.

At the end of a week in which fashion direction had seemed as unstable as the economy, Jacobs caught in these clothes a bravura and joie de vivre. Sure the skirts were ultrashort, the better to show off the walk-tall sandals with their fantastical decoration. This was a rosy, optimistic view of dressing, with a hint of the Folies Bergère to add showgirl fun and to tint colors from metallic purple to grass green and orange. Let's just call Jacobs's stellar effort to make fashion feel good and to make sense after four weeks of turbulence "La Vie en Rose."

"Women will buy something they can't resist - you have to give them the dream," said the Lanvin designer Alber Elbaz, joking that, with banks crumbling, a dress looked like a good investment.

The end of his show created that jolt of desire in its vivid mixes of sweet, but never sugary colors, and its introduction of playful animal prints, bold sunglasses and crystal glitter shoes.

But, like Paris Fashion Week itself, Lanvin left the best until last. The show built up slowly from tweaks to the familiar shadow-the-body silhouette. A dress would break into a round shape with a single puffed-up sleeve or with a draped skirt, the shapes always carefully measured so that slim pants would balance a fuller top. From the start, Elbaz was underscoring the codes of the house, from visible zippers to jewelry perfectly toned to the cloth at the breast. The clothes were gentle, enhanced the wearer and with the addition of pretty colors like yellow and sky blue, they will be snapped up by Lanvin fans.

But the designer suddenly broke out, as outfits were rendered in juicy mixes of coral and raspberry or cranberry with puce. The feline prints came out on slinky dresses and everything seemed to get more vital, as if the colors were digitally enhanced to dramatic effect. Although he was slow to move forward, Elbaz was right to build up to a crescendo, leaving the audience cheering at the delicate Lanvin mix of consistency and courage.

The concept of exploring diverse regions and cultures but bringing them right home to Paris has been a theme of the French season - and nowhere more so than at Hermès. Jean Paul Gaultier produced desert sand, punctuated with prickly cacti, for his runway; and he had swishing fringe Mexican hats and even South America's multicolored stripes in the show. Yet never has Hermès looked more energetic, upscale and quintessentially French.

Gaultier has had some difficulty reconciling his ebullient spirit and witty gimmicks with the haute house of Hermès. But not this season, where the choice of the former top models Stephanie Seymour and Naomi Campbell to open the show sent a twin message: that luxurious suede outfits edged in fringe can be body conscious; and can be worn by women as well as skinny young girls.

By the time the leather hats had been tossed to the audience and sleek leather cases for a single Havana cigar were held between gloved finger and thumb, it was clear that Gaultier's wanderlust theme was far more than a tedious travelogue. It brought inventive accessories from colonial, hard-surface travel bags, inset with animal prints, to pendant necklaces slung on leather laces. Add clutch bags and fingerless gloves.

These essential extras for a luxury brand enhanced the clothes. Once the soft beige and other neutral colors gave way to the Mexican stripes, things got a little overwrought. But the effect was so upbeat that the merriment and the intense work Gaultier had put in carried the show.