At Paris Fashion Week, 'Broken' Twill, Power Dressing — and Black

PARIS - The designer Christophe Lemaire may be exiting his role as creative director at Hermès, presenting his last collection for the luxury house next week, but he does so on his own winged sandals.

In the sunlight-flooded Bibliothèque Nationale on Wednesday morning, Mr. Lemaire's label issued a strong and simple set of looks based on natural fibers, his savor of which could be detected in the menu-like program notes, with its references to 'crispy cotton,' 'broken twill' and 'molded leather.'

Could I get those with a side of seersucker, please?

When using fabrics like denim, chambray and linen it would be easy to fall back on the American catalog, specifically J.Crew and other repositories of prep. But Mr. Lemaire cuts, drapes and wraps them in a personal and unusual way. A few of the garments bagged unflatteringly, and I don't see much call for a jumbo gilet in khaki gabardine, but most promised enduring and confident comfort in a manner that recalled, as his work has before, the American sportswear designer Claire McCardell.

Oddly, Ms. McCardell was cited as an inspiration for the latest collection by Marcel Marongiu for Guy Laroche, presented against a jazzy soundtrack a couple of hours later at the Grand Palais. I found the idea hard to glimpse, except maybe in the navy jumpsuits that sexily exposed backs or solar plexuses, jumpsuits always having some Rosie the Riveter oomph to them.

Otherwise this was straightforward power dressing in yellows and blues, with lots of cocktail shorts (alas, no cocktails), flowing maxidresses for off days and conservative prints.

The show started more than a half-hour late, inciting an angry roar from the photo pit, before whom the models struck poses of exaggerated RuPaul drama perhaps disproportionate to what they wore.

Points to Mr. Lemaire for comparative modesty: His show began so subtly that many of the squinting attendees didn't notice, until a series of quiet beeps gradually grew more urgent, like a space signal.

Seasoned travelers from Planet Fashion often talk about how different and special shows used to be in those bad old days of the '80s, before they were corporatized by Mercedes-Benz et al., overrun by publicists wearing more wires than the Secret Service and instantly channeled into clickable online galleries.

Presented on a bank by the Seine before graffiti-covered pillars that hold up the City of Fashion and Design building, the spring 2015 show presented by Anthony Vaccarello felt like a postcard from that time. A cumulus cloud of cigarette smoke hung over the audience, which was filled with women in black, including one of Jane Birkin's daughters, Lou Doillon (real celebrities in the bad old days rarely bothered with fashion shows).

And the file of models that came down the very, very long runway - long enough, in my estimation, for a small plane to take off, as Mr. Lemaire's had been - also were wearing a lot of black. Their skirts were sliced to bare one hip, or simply very short. Necklines tended to dangle in long open cowls or Vs, and more than one woman's bosom was revealed through translucent chiffon or sprang free altogether, though it wasn't clear whether by accident or design. This being Paris, nonchalance was woven into the outfit.

Mr. Vaccarello's other big idea was to cut up his name and the date of the collection and rearrange the letters on the garments in a kind of mega-logomania that, while felicitous, anagrammatically, for this particular reviewer, will probably not guarantee the posterity for which he hopes. Or maybe the gesture was intended to symbolize the transience of all fashion, in which case I applaud him like an editor from the bad old days, with both hands free of tweeting device.

Cédric Charlier sent another, more colorful postcard the next morning, from the Espace Modem - 'a concrete bunker,' my seatmate, crammed next to me on the bench, called it. Across from us there were fishnets, silly hats and a hoisted toddler, giving the room an improvised 'Pretty in Pink' air. (But where was the former Parisian Molly Ringwald when one needed her?)

And many of the clothes, correspondingly, looked run up on the Singer. There were exposed stitches, like basting, on a sleeveless jacket. Under this undone tailoring many of the skirts were colorfully layered, one strapless dress rippling casually in blue and green like a sea creature, with asymmetric hemlines.

The ubiquitous shower sandals had made it out to the 10th Arrondissement. But this being Paris, they had big bows on the toes.

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