Albino D'Amato decided not to do a formal show this season. The French-Italian designer is in the middle of a move to Paris after seven years in Milan, so he's scaling back and regrouping. His Fall collection is its own kind of homecoming. The designer studied architecture and industrial design in school, and his earliest collections were full of the sculptural shapes he returned to today. Coats with rounded shoulders and cocoon silhouettes, blouses and tops with full sleeves and low armholes, and dresses with pouf skirts below drop waists situated him in the middle of fashion's new-again craze for oversize volumes. More often than not, D'Amato worked in solid colors—dusty rose, oxblood, lots of neutrals—which made his Rorschach wallpaper prints (especially the one in green and navy he used for a simple shift) and hand-knit tweeds stand out all the more. One clever idea had him piecing together a cable knit with wool flannel on a sporty jacket. So far, this relocation to Paris is looking like a good move.
