Haute happenings: Tales from the Paris Couture Spring/Summer 2014 season

Christian Dior

Like at Chanel, footwear took an avant-garde turn - silvery garters snaked up the calf attached to Glomesh pumps, and rosebuds sprouted from neoprene reef slip-ons, furthering Simons' calculated subversion of couture codes with an urban edge

Valentino

Pierpaolo Piccioli and Maria Grazia Chiuri have had the history books open at Valentino lately, with their Spring haute couture show a decidedly daring breakout into graphic and mythological territories. Opera was a starting point, and the opening dress arrived in tucked, transparent tulle emblazoned with the musical notes of La Traviata dancing along a silvery stave

Valentino

Later the musical tale expanded into appliqué animalia and ethnic tassels, cashmere sheaths and masterful featherwork, as each dress channelled a different opera in cloth

Maison Martin Margiela

The anonymous team at Maison Martin Margiela call their 'haute couture' line the Artisanal collection, treating it as an experimental study rather than a purpose-built luxury wardrobe. That's why its collection remains the most curious and progressive of the week, even though the anchor of their Spring 2014 offering (as always, to some extent) was archival fabrics and homewares, like pleating by Mariano Fortuny and 1950s Frank Lloyd Wright designs transformed as coats and corsets

Photography: Edouard Capeil

Maison Martin Margiela

If the references sound retro - domestic, even - the effect was anything but. We witnessed an eclectic, embellished display of simple shapes resplendent in crinkled textures and jingly, jangly embroidery of found objects

Photography: Edouard Capeil

Giambattista Valli

Now three years into his haute couture journey, the self-made Roman couturier Giambattista Valli has amassed a formidable front-row following and a reputation for 'neo-classical' eveningwear, mixing blooms and leafy metalwork in two silhouettes - mini and maxi

Giambattista Valli

Spring 2014 saw him discover a new muse, an insouciant, imaginary Parisian party girl found at the bottom of his garden. In swathes of emerald, mint and cobalt, she came wrapped in satin bows and draped asymmetry, with embroidery like armour: shiny beaded-tanks were layered on taffeta and clusters of tiny flowers were cut from holographic foil

Vionnet

The latest coup in creative director Goga Ashkenazi's Vionnet takeover was the recent announcement that Turkish-Cypriot designer Hussein Chalayan would lend his hand to the demi-couture collection, the first of which was shown in a garage space strewn with gilded frames and roadwork signs

Vionnet

Both technology and industrial design informed Chalayan's work (nothing new for the conceptualist), which manifested in the sinuous yet sterile way he incorporated electrical cords as jewellery, belts and halternecks on multi-pleated maxi-dresses, and the quiet symmetry of laser cut circles on pastel gazar gowns. A finale of tabard dresses were scored all over with tiny crosses and outlined like a paper patronage, in an ode to the atelier and proof that Chalayan's sense of metafiction is alive and kicking
 

Ulyana Sergeenko

Haute Couture is an international playground, and the Russian designer Ulyana Sergeenko is quickly catching on - broadening her distinctly Soviet horizons for a train journey across the East for Spring 2014

Ulyana Sergeenko

Sergeenko made up the Pavillion Cambon like a powder blue steam train carriage and employed milliner Stephen Jones to top her bustled satin gowns and boned corsets with scrunched headbands and bugle-beaded, pillbox hats

Armani Privé

Mr Armani continued his global tour de force with an Armani Privé show entitled 'Nomade' for Spring 2014, before inviting guests to preview 'Eccentrico' at the Palais de Tokyo, now the sixth destination of his travelling exhibition

Armani Privé

The Privé collection channelled the eclectic spirit of Armani's archival showcase, with cloudy blue silk wrapped as headscarves, cut in micro-dot jacquard blouses or sweeping the floor in fluid plissé skirts