Paris has become the city of mega-brands and luxury conglomerates. A place where dresses once again sport interlocking Cs; where saddlebags and now clothing are emblazoned with the initials CD; where models and handbags appear dog-tagged with the words Celine and where an LV monogram canvas can be a trench-coat, a baseball cap or an umbrella. This is a city driven by a dream, a dream to emulate the blockbuster success of Gucci. And the route they have picked in their quest for commercial nirvana is a catwalk strewn with must-have merchandise emblazoned with that status symbol of the 1980s, the logo.
At face value, such extravagance may be deeply worrying to the generation that experienced logo-mania first hand, but the difference between what the fashion houses accomplished then and what they hope to achieve now is a liberal dose of humour. The millennium designer has his tongue firmly in his cheek, making this revivalism vibrant, energetic and lots of fun.
Galliano displayed a wicked sense of humour with his iconoclastic Dior Logo A GoGo collection that not only slapped the signature CD all over jodhpurs, gaucho skirts and saddlebags (his was an equestrian theme, but classics were cut and reassembled offkilter) but even took liberties with what looked very like the Hermes silk scarf. (Hermes, incidentally, did not participate in this logo-fest, excusing themselves because everyone knows them for their scarves anyway.) Chanel seemed happier, with Lagerfeld making his witty takes on the interlocking Cs logo or using the quilted handbag as inspiration for flak jackets, vests and what can only be described as oven gloves.
Having taken a discreet, intellectual approach to clothing when he joined Louis Vuitton two years ago with nothing so brash as a logo in sight, Marc Jacobs has made a complete volte face with a collection in which you would be hard-pushed to find anything without the house signature. However, he made the look sexy and sporty and played on Vuitton's jet-set heritage, adding windbreakers, shorts and swimwear for the new leisured classes. Narcisso Rodriguez at Loewe, meanwhile, restrained himself from using the logo on anything more obvious than the rivet of a hand-held portfolio, but there was no mistaking for whom the collection was intended - the beautiful white, suede shift must be classed as fashion's most impractical yet most desired item of the season. Gaultier, though, had the last laugh, sending them all up with a collection that mocked their excesses by piling kitsch accessories onto models decked out in bright drag-queen wigs, long false nails and Warhol-print dresses and leggings.
Not everyone was caught up in the logo mania. Stella McCartney, for example, ignored it completely at Chloe, where she turned out one of the prettiest collections of the week. Using a scarf as her starting point (a recurring theme around the shows) she transformed hand-painted, antique, fringed shawls into pretty tunics, dresses, blouses and halter-neck tops with scarf-tied necklines and then teamed them with sexy, fringed white jeans.
In a city reputed for its avant garde creativity, you had to look to the Japanese, Belgian and indeed one young Irish designer for innovation this season, with everyone else so consumed by merchandise and profit margins. To find clothes that were both intellectually and emotionally stimulating you had to experience Comme des Garcons, Yohji Yamamoto, Issey Miyake and Junya Watanabe. Here you got inventive cutting and a sweet gentleness of thought. Comme des Garcons showed innocent little chemises and peasant skirts with hems absentmindedly tucked into knickers and stretchy tops pulled over loose shirts and jackets to create crushed patterns. They were decked out with bunches of ruffles, added not so much for femininity as to create more texture.
Yohji Yamamoto drew seams to the front of a fitted blouse or a jacket which culminated in a layer of folds that cascaded over loose trousers or a long skirt. Innovation extended to fabrics at Junya Watanabe, the one-time protege of Rei Kawakubo at Comme des Garcons. All the fabrics were water-repellent, a fact confirmed by the shower of water the models wandered through on the catwalk. Water bounced off shiny 1960s-style Palm Beach floral skirts, pie-frilled dresses and sober-looking shifts which, with a clever bit of zipping, reversed to a frilly cocktail dress. The gentle innocence of the Japanese collections was echoed by Irish designer Sharon Wauchob, who experimented with mille feuille layers of muslin or draped pleats which she staggered across the body to create slightly voluminous feminine shapes of infinite charm. Her show demonstrated that fashion is as much about satisfying spiritual needs as it is about boosting the balance sheet. And you don't necessarily need a handbag for that.