Paris Fashion Week: Gaultier, Sonia Rykiel and Cacharel

Jean Paul Gaultier is said to have attempted to embrace his age with this collection. "It was about women who say 'I don't want to look like my teenage daughter,'" Gaultier told journalists in a post-show interview Photograph: Pierre Verdy/AFP

Gaultier opened the show with 46-year-old actor Valerie Lemercier. Models peeled off layer after layer as they walked Photograph: Jacques Brinon/AP

... although it did not appear that many of the models were themselves actually middle aged Photograph: Benoit Tessier/Reuters

The models walked on floor-level rather than a raised runway, reducing the show to a parade of the oversized gray beehive wigs for all but those in the front row Photograph: Jacques Brinon/AP

The theme that grey is beautiful did not extend to the clothes' colours: some even wore 70s-inspired jumpsuits in eyepopping prints shot with glinting Lurex Photograph: Benoit Tessier/Reuters

Models at the Gaultier show tossed their scarves into the crowd and shrugged off trompe l'oeil trenchcoats Photograph: Benoit Tessier/Reuters

'It's the 'bourgeoisie sans age,' Gaultier said, a phrase that translates, flatly in English, as the ageless bourgeois lady. Clothes so ageless, it would seem, that even young models look good in them Photograph: Benoit Tessier/Reuters

Viktor and Rolf presented a collection reminiscent of maurauding midaeval barbarians. They even had face paint Photograph: Gonzalo Fuentes/Reuters

French fashion house Cacharel presented a show which was at times in nude colours ... Photograph: Ian Langsdon/EPA

... and other times in bold patterns Photograph: Ian Langsdon/EPA

Cacharel put pattern over pattern in clashing layers Photograph: Ian Langsdon/EPA

Australian designer Martin Grant chose a feminine, satiny look Photograph: Emma Foster/EPA

French designer Sonia Rykiel focused on outerwear, with a fall collection of princess coats made from tartan blankets Photograph: Ian Langsdon/EPA

The coats in ochre, blood orange, lilac and Bordeaux were fitted out with patch pockets or sprouted oversized sleeves in fox fur dyed eyepopping hues Photograph: Ian Langsdon/EPA

The trend of grafting fur sleeves onto wool coats has swept Paris' runways, from Balmain to Dries Van Noten Photograph: Pascal Le Segretain/Getty

Japanese designer Tsumori Chisato sent out jumpsuits in zany pastel colorblock Photograph: Ian Langsdon/EPA

Ribbed caps that looked like old school bathing caps, complete with the sensible chinstraps, topped off all the outfits. Paired with the oversized Iris Apfel-style owl glasses, it was really quite a look Photograph: Ian Langsdon/EPA