Alberta Ferretti's pre-fall starts where the collection she showed at Pitti Uomo last week left off. Here, as there, there were feathers, fur, and lace to spare. The difference is, the show she put on in Florence was mostly eveningwear, and the focus in New York was daywear. Super-polished daywear, that is, like a camel wrap coat with Norwegian fox collar and cuffs, or an oxblood leather skirtsuit with prominent shoulders, a turned-up collar, and a little flip at the hem of the the skirt. Ferretti paired everything with semi-opaque rib-knit stockings, which gave even a little black lace cocktail number a dressed-down feel. For after-dark, she showed a shorter version of the matte silver sequin dress from Pitti, this one in gold and with a flapper-ish vibe. Other evening pieces had a surprising edge: With long diaphanous slips peeking out from beneath above-the-knee frocks, they keyed into the Spring runways' sheer trend.
