Donna Karan came home to New York for Fall. The walls of her Greenwich Street space displayed past advertising campaigns that used the city as a backdrop. On the runway below, everything looked so right (save for the costume-y feather chapeaux) that you had to wonder why the designer ever looks elsewhere for inspiration. Revisiting one of her earliest signatures, Karan built this collection around bodysuits. In a season of such minimalist layers, they fit right in, turning bustier jersey dresses into legitimate daytime looks, and introducing a welcome dose of ease to hourglass silhouettes in silk satin. The interplay of matte and shine (stretch satin belts cinching wool double knits) and bright shots of chartreuse, teal, and violet against black were other timely motifs, but what the designer explored in greatest detail, what she seemed most charged about, was draping.
For evening, swirls of jewel-tone silk charmeuse curled from one shoulder around the body to the hem, sometimes with fans of taffeta decorating the bust. Jackets in organza mohair tweed and silk radzimir were softened with gently molded lapels that blossomed open to reveal bare necklines. These were paired with the season's slightly rounded and elongated skirts. Pants played a very minor role, which is too bad, because the trousers that Karan showed with belted tunics could fill the gaping void for such chic practicalities that exists on the New York runways.
