Jonathan Saunders Last week, visiting Maria Grachvogel’s studio, I got into a debate with her about what to call the shade of poison-green she was using in her catwalk collection. Greener than chartreuse; paler than olive. The colour, I decided, of posh olive oil, the kind you get with the sourdough in nice restaurants. Well, lucky I came up with the admittedly-not-that-snappy Posh Olive Oil moniker, because variations on that colour were everywhere this week: lime-tinted at Peter Pilotto and Matthew WIlliamson, rich and mossy at Jonathan Saunders. Next season, this particular green is the colour of money. Photograph: Yui Mok
Mary Katrantzou
Y’all know I love London fashion week, right? Yeah, I think you do. I bang on about it enough. So, now, I’ve got a gripe. Some of this week’s collections were a little po-faced. After the bumptuous triumph of September’s shows, some super-talented London designers seemed to stiffen up, frozen like rabbits in the headlights. Mary Katrantzou’s about-turn from the sunniest print and colour in town to bleak midwinter branches was baffling; Michael Van Der Ham’s fake-burnhole pieces detracted from the (gorgeous) pencil skirts. Photograph: Tim Whitby
Preen
This colour trilogy is autumn/winter in a nutshell. Ketchup red tailoring at Preen with a liberal spattering of black, and a crisp white border; heady red lace on a black background at Clements Ribeiro, set off by punky pale-white legs. Oxblood and burgundy are fashion shades in their own right: the sequinned jumpsuit worn by Jourdan Dunn on the Topshop Unique catwalk pipped even Burberry’s transparent vinyl oxblood macs to claim the prize for steamiest look of the week. Photograph: Tim Whitby
Burberry
When Christopher Bailey seized on cute, rounded lovehearts as the motif for this season’s Burberry catwalks, the Twitter wags wondered whether he was taking inspiration from the now-inescapable Instagram "like" motif. Who knows? But two things are definitely true: 1, the cutesy heart is the new smiley face, and 2, after a starring role on the Burberry catwalk, there will be no doubt that the high street hearts the heart. Photograph: Rex Features
Tom Ford
Considering how sex, as everyone knows, sells, it is surprisingly often absent from the catwalk. But not this season. My theory is that the presence of the Tom Ford name on the schedule got everyone’s primal competitive instincts up: no one does sexy like Ford, after all. Jonathan Saunders topped his dresses with PVC bustiers; the pencil skirt that has been a catwalk staple for several seasons suddenly developed a saucy split (dream of Tom Ford; buy Whistles). Photograph: Ben Stansall
Christopher Kane
Fuzzy is the new soft. Now that cashmere comes piled up high at Uniqlo, the catwalk is taking haute-knitwear in a different direction. Christopher Kane’s sea-urchin dresses were the most extreme vision of hairs-stand-on-end fuzziness, but the furball look was everywhere from Topshop Unique to Jonathan Saunders, where the fuzzy sweater with a glazed-vinyl circle skirt combo looked set to tip off a front- row trend for next season. Photograph: Sipa/Rex Features
Topshop Unique
The boyfriend-sized aviator will be next season’s It coat. Mulberry jackets in super-luxe Toscana sheepskin were the ultimate in catwalk desirability, but there were a cheering number of more realistically priced versions too. It is hard to pick a highlight from the Whistles show, but the sheepskin is up there; Topshop Unique’s cosy number, as modelled by Rosie Tapner, was another delight. Runner-up as autumn’s cool coat: Peter Pilotto’s cocoon-luxe sleek, printed puffa. Photograph: Sipa/Rex Features
Matthew Williamson
Stars had a catwalk moment a few seasons ago, but now that love hearts are now the new stars, the star itself has been replaced by the Milky Way. Mulberry and Matthew Williamson both took the night sky as this season’s starting point. At Matthew Williamson it was the Northern Lights, and a spectacular light show depicted as digitally printed snow scapes and iridiscent sequins on full-length gowns. At Mulberry it was flower fairies and science and sorcery of flowers, with meadow blooms glowing on a midnight-hued backdrop. Photograph: Victor Virgile
Clements Ribeiro
The punk influence all over this week’s catwalks is coming from New York, in more ways than one: the Metropolitan Museum’s forthcoming Punk show seems to have put punk back on the design agenda, but it is specifically “what the Americans call punk - very Debbie Harry” as Thea Bregazzi put it, after her Preen show. Richard Nicoll also specified the New York underground and Debbie Harry as references for his show, which was one of my favourites of the week. Kilts (Matthew Williamson to Christopher Kane), PVC (Holly Fulton) and tartan (everywhere) will be the high-street takeaway come September. Photograph: catwalking.com
Mulberry
Max the Mulberry poodle faced early competition as the hottest catwalk animal this week, when a mouse made an unscheduled scurry past the front row benches as we waited for Rihanna’s River Island show to start on Saturday night. After Riri-Mouse had enjoyed his 15 seconds of fame, and Max the poodle had made his traditional Sunday morning promenade, the spotlight fell on the leopard-print coat as a new must have: a sleek trench at Mulberry, or a quilted fur at Tom Ford. Photograph: Sipa/Rex Features
