Betsey Makes Us Smile :Betsey Johnson’s return to the runway, after two years, was well worth the wait.  The show opened with model thin, Kelly Osbourne, who strutted down a hay scattered runway with two bright green toy guns in hand; can you say Wild Wild West.  Johnson’s inspiration this season was 45 years worth of her own archives. "I’m working on my stuff, being very true-blue Betsey," she said.  The final look at the show was a dedication to the late designer Alexander McQueen. A model, adorned with enlarged red wax lips walked down the runway with a small bouquet of red roses and a sign that said, "LONG LIVE MCQUEEN!"

Buy Straight Off the Runway: Proenza Schouler designer’s Jack McCollough and Lazaro Hernandez are exclusively selling their runway bags on their website, proenzaschouler.com, 24 hours after their F/W 2010 collection on Wednesday, Feb 17 at Milk Studios.  Online shoppers can preorder the fall handbags straight from the runway through the recently introduced e-commerce on the site.

Unisex Clothing: Androgyny was the theme for Rad Hourani’s F/W 2010 collection. The show included both the male and female models dressed in tights, high heels, bike shorts, and layers of black. The coats had multiple compartments and zippers, so one piece could transform into several different shapes.  "Unisex is my main focus," Hourani told NY Times. "All my pieces are unisex so you can wear it feminine, masculine, a guy can wear it, a girl can wear it, at any age, anytime, anywhere…I don’t like to put limits to gender," the Canadian-born designer explained. "I think everybody is feminine, and everybody is born unisex."

Keeping Your Hands Warm: Gloves are perhaps one of the must-have accessories this season, so choosing the right pair can make all the difference.  They commanded lots of attention on the runways, each uniquely designed, with new variations of textures, fabrics, and colors.  Donna Karan’s long pair featured flower-shape cutouts that created a lacy-leather effect.  Chris Benz designed eye-catching lime-green furry mitts.   And Carolina Herrera’s just below the elbow gloves wove apple-red patent leather and suede together.

A Return to Elegance: Carolina Herrera, one of the most elegantly dressed designers in fashion, delivered a charming and glamorous collection fit for a lady.  The clothes were an outright presentation of pure luxury, with fur trim, voluminous sleeves, and wide-leg silk pants.   She impressed the critics right down to Cathy Horyn of the New York Times who wrote she “seemed to put more of herself into the clothes,” including a dress printed in tiny reproductions of a family photo.  WWD added, “The embrace of opulence felt oddly comforting.”  Everyone seemed to appreciate the designer’s return to elegance.

Feeling the Cut Backs: After throwing one of the most lavish runway shows last season adorned with five grand pianos lining the runway, Zac Posen cuts back substantially for his latest collection.  As recession woes hit designers, especially small companies like Posen, it’s sad to see how they have to hold back creatively.  The collection was far removed from Posen’s usual obsession with ball skirts and gowns, but in their absence, he focused on sportswear for the season.  The collection was a combination of pantsuits with a forties flair, luxe coats to brightly colored separates, stacked Plexiglas bangles and pom pom peppered shoes, which all worked together to deliver something cohesive and vibrant.  Keeping his core customer in mind, Posen maintained high and sexy hemlines, yet provided something for the conservative set in straight-legged satin pants and mandarin collar jackets.

The Devil Really Does Wear Prada: Former Vogue cover girl, Paulina Porizkova, seeks revenge in a Huffington Post blog after she gets snubbed by Anna Wintour in the ladies’ room at a recent AmFAR benefit.  Porizkova writes: "I walked in and almost straight into Anna Wintour.’Hi, Anna,’ I said brightly to Anna’s mirror reflection. Her large eyes in her large head flickered. And with the slightest nod, one that may have been a twitch, she left me standing at the sinks. I admit I felt a bit more than slighted, I was after all, on quite a few covers of her magazine, and the glance she gave me is one I’d give to an expired carton of milk. I am aware my expiration date (as a model) is long past, but a slight acknowledgment that I wasn’t the bathroom attendant would have been nice."

Jacobs Pleases the Crowd: To start the F/W 2010 show, Marc Jacobs and Robert Duffy appeared on opposite corners and ripped away brown paper covering a simple wood stage at the end of the runway, revealing a tableau of 56 models elegantly dressed in a palette of soft neutral colors, pale pastels and demure shapes.  Heightened by Frederic Sanchez’s soundtrack, covers of “Over the Rainbow” blared out the speakers as the first girl took to the runway in a gray sweatshirt with a crisscrossed back, tweedy gray culottes and ankle socks.  To those familiar with the designer’s early work, it all seemed to be a case of déjà vu. The collection was 180 degrees removed from last fall’s wild Eighties theme but the design process remained constant. “Everything is a celebration of something, whether it’s beige or Day-Glo yellow,” Jacobs said. “It doesn’t have to be a thing. You can make a thing out of anything you’re passionate about.”

Victoria Beckham Charms Them: In an intimate presentation for about 20-30 people, at the grand Upper East Side room, Victoria Beckham had quite a posh affair.   With an audience that included Carine Roitfeld, Nina Garcia and Karl Lagerfeld, you have a room filled with fashions most respected.  Victoria Beckham’s Dick Tracy-inspired fall collection charmed the critics, not to mention her personal greetings and look-by-look narration. British Vogue called it “a very beautiful collection that evolved her body con aesthetic,” and Style.com declared that “there wasn’t one bad dress in the bunch.” Most critics noted the evolution of Beckham’s designs, admiring a “newfound focus on draping and fluidly.” 

The Kolkata Fashion & Lifestyle Week in its all new avatar commences from the February 24th, 2010. This fashion week is being spearheaded by Yudhajit Dutta the dynamic Managing director of Purple People Entertainment. After the split with the Kolkata Fashion Week it has come forward as a very promising event for the city with renowned designers like Narendra Kumar, JJ Valaya, Satya Paul, Zubair Kirmani, Samant Chauhan showcasing here.

As Yudhajit says, “The KFLW is not Kolkata centric but it aims towards a national platform for fashion but there is no doubt that it proves influential for the designers from Kolkata and also satisfies the growing demand and awareness of the fashion conscious city.”

The theme of the event this year is Eco Fashion, which refers to clothing and fashion that is environmentally sensitive fabrics and uses eco-friendly production techniques. The theme has been selected in view of the fact that 2010 has been declared the ‘year of biodiversity’ by the United Nations. And hence the designers showcasing at KFLW will present at least one line of eco sensitive collection. The Fashion Week is also propagating the cause for SAVE Tigers and in this endevour the after parties at the fashion week have paid passes, the proceeds from which would be donated towards the cause.

On the question of the increasing number of fashion weeks in India Dutta responds, “There are both good and bad points to any clause and so is the case with the fashion weeks as well. We at KFLW embody a serious take on fashion and business and we are spending a lot of money in organizing the event. Thus India with a population of more than one billion can be represented more than two or three fashion weeks as per the increase in awareness and reach of fashion in the country.”

The young designers showcasing at the KFLW have been through a selection procedure and proved themselves on the basis of their design and creativity.  And thus young talent such as Arjun Agarwal, Aarti Vijay Gupta, Debarun Mukherjee, Gopal Roy, Jaya Mishra, Radhika Sayantan, Souvik Aditi, Soma Nath and Tejas Gandhi will showcase their creations on the same platform. The models sashaying down the ramp are all Elite models. The buyers list is also quite an exhaustive one with national and International buyers already signed in for the event.

“Kolkata has open handedly welcomed the fashion week and the design fraternity has also registered serious business and overwhelming clientele which brings the designers back again to the city. Also designers like Dev r Nil who haven’t had the need to showcase outside Kolkata since the inception of the fashion week in the city. Thus we aim towards a serious fashion business at this fashion week and it’s not a show just for the sake of having a fashion show,” says Yudhajit Dutta.

The Indo-French designers have united not only the East and the West but also the past to the future. Their early years were spent in Paris at an Haute Coutre House, a field where garments are unique pieces of art, handmade to perfection abiding the principles of a secular manufacturing tradition. They later moved to India where they continue to work with an identical approach, but at a Hi-tech industrial level. Their new headquarters thus unite the concept of an atelier or traditional workroom with ultra modern cutting edge technology, a challenge to create a unique product.

To divulge you more on this duo, we bring you Hemant in an exclusive tete-a-tete with Fashiofad.in :

Tell us the story of how and when you started with your label?
I have never been seriously interested in anything else than fashion in my life and have thus not ever have had to search – all my youth was thus a build-up to get into this business. When I met Lecoanet in school in Paris we started working together within days of meeting and it has stayed like that – setting up the company and the label etc were just natural in this context

Which designer gave you the most inspiration in your fashion career?
Many and nobody in particular

How do you look back on your journey as a designer?
I don’t really look back except for reminiscing, I find present tense much more exciting, in fact present tense is the only place you can do things in life.

If you are on a budget and can afford only a great haircut, a great handbag, or a statement coat, what should you invest in to give you the most personal style?
A haircut … the rest can be improvised

What is your thought on the future of fashion? More specifically, what kind of changes will you bring to your brand?
What I do today was partially decided in my youth, other things, more details maybe just this morning. There is no future of Fashion, only Present fashion, the rest is planning it out … I plan a continuation of my own logic … no revolutions

What inspires you most to design? 
I believe in being creative, full stop. That includes writing, sports, cooking even financials

What house/brand would you design (for?) if you were not Lecoanet Hemant (?) and why?
That’s science fiction

The clothing you create is amazing. How do you keep going even through the hard times, or design blocks?
Design is about 0.5% of the work and usually takes about 15-20 seconds … recognizing its subjective value is the key of understanding … knowing how to make it is everything .. there is nothing like a beautiful design that is badly crafted … to me it’s bad design … or rather just bad!

Which was your inspirational item or person when you came up with your first collection?
Like all first collections this was full of ideas, in fact simply too many… the following years were needed to simplify … The first collection in haute Couture in Paris was an "Ode to the Monsoon"

High fashion can be very expensive and also ephemeral; keeping this in mind and the fact that there is a global economic crisis, not to mention a growing percentile of famine, poverty, pollution, disease, and conflict, what advice would you give in order to maintain a personal balance between investing time and money in fashion and altruistic involvement toward improvement in society and the environmental?
The more High Fashion is expensive the more it fights again poverty in the world: …  which also means the cheaper fashion is the more it helps develop poverty in the world. High Fashion is transparent management with ethics and higher salaries than the rest which lives by bargaining cheap labour down, is unethical, often does not pay taxes and encourages black money. Please reconsider your question.

What are the fashion essentials that a person has to have in order to exude glamour?
I don’t know … maybe glamour?

Which decade do you think is most important to fashion, and how are you inspired by that decade?
I live and work now, knowing the history of your business is super important but will never be anything else than history and a lesson … what you are doing now is the exam.

Akaaro is the first alphabet in Sanskrit and aptly resonates for a brand or design philosophy that is rooted and yet contemporary and directional. Akaaro was launched at the prestigious ORIGIN: The London Craft fair in 2007 and has been a regular since then. The designer behind the label is Gaurav Gupta who creates and weaves hand woven garments and accessories through Akaaro. He has his studio based in Delhi and showcases internationally and is known for his innovative textile with engineered and cutting edge designs. Gaurav is trained at Chelsea College of Art and Design London in Woven Textiles and National Institute of Fashion Technology Delhi in Fashion and Graphics. And it was here that the seeds of Akaaro first sprouted in him. When still in college he was regular at the London Craft Fair and had always dreamt of launching his label from that very platform. And thus his dream came true when in 2007 his application was selected.

Late last year Gaurav Gupta was selected for the prestigious “Shared Talent India” Project for promoting Indian sustainable textiles an initiative by Centre of Sustainable Fashion, London which was exhibited at London Fashion Week. With coverage in some very prestigious selected publications (SELVEDGE, U.K) Gaurav s studio has been identified as one of the most promising young studio out of India.   He was invited to co-curate and exhibit in a specially curated show called London Calling in Tokyo on the commemoration of 150 years of British and Japanese Friendship in October 2008, the same was inaugurated by Professor Jimmy Choo in Tokyo. Following this he was asked by Professor Jimmy Choo to design a fabric for a pair of sling back for RSA in India. He has recently been invited to exhibit at ALL TIED UP a special curation which showcases works of 14 most contemporary textile designers internationally. The work is on display at the moment at the Ruthin Crafts Centre in Wales till March which will be followed by another showcase in Bath where he has been invited to exhibit at Bath Festival in May.

Gaurav who would prefer calling his collections as design projects is man who is highly aware of his environment adopts inspiration from whatever he sees, hears, and feels thus no wonder that his creations have reached a level where the product is able to evoke feelings. Unraveling the different layers and dimensions of his work Gaurav codes his design perceptions as very visual thus he has interpreted his trip to Ladakh in garments, one of his inspirations was the movie Babel (which keeps shifting from city to city and sets the co-relation between something happening at one end of the world to the other end) and yet another time he translated everything fragile around him into clothes. He works on fabrics like silk, wool and cotton where the textile is also designed and created at his studio.

His association with the prestigious Central Saint Martins London as a trend forecaster from Delhi in 2006 for a British publication called Preview has a prolific expression on his design behavior. As he cultivates a fashion pattern that is progressive and holds the opinion that designers are one of the tangents on which fashion forecasts are based.

Akaaro products retails from selected galleries, stores and museums across England, Tokyo and New Delhi along with some British websites. And Gaurav Gupta is about to make his debut in India very soon at WIFW.

Fur-ever: Fur was a common theme at Thursday’s shows including Richard Chai, Vena Cava, Chado Ralph Rucci, Jen Kao and Cushnie et Ochs (who used silver fox fur thanks to the label’s sponsor Saga Fur) "I believe people will buy fur in the fall. It keeps you warm," said Bloomingdale’s fashion director Stephanie Solomon. "And for those who don’t like the idea of fur, there is great faux fur."

Lingerie Trend Continues at Preen: Talented duo Justin Thornton and Thea Bregazzi made an impact on Fashion Week delivering a sensational show for Preen’s F/W 2010 collection.

Opening the show with a floral bustier dress worn with a cropped turtleneck knit, that exposed a band of skin in front and a bra strap in back, one could only expect more exciting things to come.  And they did!  For the first part of the collection the pair drew inspiration from Peter Saville’s floral album-cover design of New Order’s Power, Corruption & Lies and later they “wanted to add masculine tailoring,” said Thornton.  Almost every look incorporated a strapless bra, which was visibly worked into the design of the dresses and shirts.  Looks like spring’s lingerie trend will stick around for fall at Preen.

Attention Model Down!: It was over at Naomi Campbell’s Fashion for Relief show on Friday Feb 12, 2010, which benefited Haiti, that supermodel Agyness Deyn, fell not once but twice.  Agyness took it like a trooper; she laughed, dusted herself off, removed the killer 7” Burberry shoes, and curtsied, then made her way down the rest of the runway.  She tweeted, "1st show of fashion week! Took a tumble! Got up! Fell again. Should have stayed down the 1st time. Twice! WTF! Ouch my knees!"

Fresh Faces: Barely there makeup was a trend for the F/W 2010 shows.  Rag & Bone, BCBG, Yigal Azrouël all favored the looks for their shows.

University Rocks: Spirits were high over at the Academy of Art University’s F/W 2010 show, where students had the chance to show off their designer skills for NY Fashion Week.  First up, Marina Solomatnikova’s Georgia O’Keefe inspired looks where she worked suede into flattering suits and dresses; then Bethany Meuleners who combined knits and wovens for a Duchamp-inspired lineup of navy dresses and bodysuits.  For Steven Oo’s collection of knitwear, the designer looked to architecture to translate very hip black sweater dresses and coats.  And, with her jeweled out felt coats, combining both craft and design, Sabah Mansoor Husain offered refined outerwear with light-catching color.

Model Radar: Jersey born supermodel Jacquelyn Jablonski may have a long week ahead.  The editorial superstar, who was hired in campaigns for D&G and Celine, opened for Charlotte Ronson and Yigal Azrouël.  Last season the model booked 58 shows…stay tuned for the end of season tally.

Jason Wu Splits the Vote: Jason Wu’s F/W 2010 certainly made an impact.  So much so that it split even the most notable of fashion critics. Times fashion critic Cathy Horyn: "Jason Wu’s homage to the photographs of Irving Penn just didn’t work. The draping of evening dresses — full-skirted deb numbers, trapezes and so forth — was clunky and labored, and one strapless silk dress had a huge swell of fabric on the model’s arm, as if a muff had crawled up her elbow.”  Most appreciated was the menswear inspired outerwear, The Wall Street Journal declared his paint-splatter coats “iconic for the season.”  But it was the eveningwear that left most divided. Though it praised a feathered tulle dress, Style.com concluded that “it didn’t work” and that some of the dresses lacked the "effervescent quality" of Wu’s best work. WWD agreed that the looks were split: some “charming in their girlish awkwardness and others, just awkward.”

American fashion designer, Marc Jacobs, has a flair for making headlines, whether it’s about his trend-setting collections, his bizarre costume parties or his personal life.  You’ve probably guessed already, Jacobs makes headlines again after the designer announced to broadcast his F/W 2010 collection online.

Sitting front row at a fashion show for designers like Marc Jacobs is a feat few people can achieve without being an A-list celebrity or Anna Wintour herself.  To solve this problem, Jacobs’ collection will be unveiled live at 8pm EST on Monday, February 15th on the designer’s website, www.marcjacobs.com.

Robert Duffy, Jacobs’ business partner, has been tweeting for several days drawing in excitement for the show.  Duffy promises a great show but can’t promise if the show will start on time tweeting, “it could be 7:30, maybe 10:30.”  No doubt Jacobs has been slammed in the past for late starts, who could forget when he started two hours late for his S/S 2008 show.  Hopefully, his tardiness won’t make most of us go blind from staring at our computer screens waiting for the show to begin.

Joining Marc Jacobs, Calvin Klein, is the latest brand to announce it will be live streaming both its men and women’s F/W 2010 collections during New York Fashion Week.  The runway show will be streamed simultaneously on www.calvinkleincollection.com and on the brand’s official Facebook page.  Facebook users will be able to take advantage of a live chat function during the show, which is sure to be a conversation about favorites and must-haves.  The men’s collection will broadcast at 2pm EST on Sunday, February 14th and the women’s collection can be viewed at 3pm EST on Thursday, February 18th.