'11 FW Iceberg

2011 Fall/Winter

Iceberg

'11 FW Dsquared

2011 Fall/Winter

Dsquared

Dean and Dan Caten rustled up a Wild West theme for Fall, complete with a covered wagon, a mountaintop backdrop, and a snow machine. The frontier girls sported long black leather duster coats, faded and frayed jeans, prairie blouses with high collars and puffed shoulders, and belted and peplumed jackets. A blazer and full-legged pants with a paper-bag waist in wrinkly linen looked like it had been filched straight out of one of their pardner's rucksacks. The 20-gallon hats were a no-brainer for the Catens, who love an OTT extra. As for what to make of the models' lace-up boots with ice skate blades for heels, well, it must be freezing at those altitudes. That would also explain the collection's grandiose furs.

by.Nicole Phelps

style.com

'11 FW Dolce & Gabbana

2011 Fall/Winter

Dolce & Gabbana

For Fall the designers returned to a favorite theme, one that happens to be getting a lot of action in Milan this week: the masculine-feminine mix. Arizona Muse was the first model out, wearing a double-breasted black jacquard jacket, matching trousers cropped right below the knee, a porkpie hat, and oxfords. The hair team even gave her sideburns. This wasn't the molto sexy, cut-to-fit tailoring of a year ago, though. Madonna circa "Open Your Heart" is more like it. Next up was one of the duo's signature long-sleeved sheaths, stitched up in bands of lace and a miniature star print. The show progressed this way, alternating between one boy look, one girl. On the "fellas": crisp shirts, low-slung pants, boxy vests, bright sequined evening jackets, and fur coats inset with stars. And for the gals: more of those sheaths, plus corset dresses and billowy floor-length numbers in bigger star patterns, lace motifs, and musical-note prints. For the finale, as has become the custom here, the models emerged en masse, but by now the "boys" had doffed their jackets to reveal their matching patent suspenders and white collared shirts. The designers' tailoring skills are as sharp as ever and no one could accuse them of losing their touch with a sexy dress.

by.Nicole Phelps

style.com