New York’s Peter Do delivered a refined and strong collection for his Paris Fashion Week debut. This was a much-needed distance between his eponymous brand’s abilities and the designer’s stint at Helmut Lang – which had some very mixed reviews at the beginning of September. “I want to make grown-up clothes,” Do said backstage yesterday. To start, what that meant here was you didn’t see the silly short-shorts that were for instance all over the Milan runways. The designer cut his blazers into horizontal sections, placing a band of silk twill lining with subtle logo details between a top and bottom in summer-weight wool. Some jackets were tucked into pants with a similar treatment. If that’s a runway styling trick that may not make it in the real world, many other pieces have good odds, like the jackets cropped at the midriff and the blazer vests with exaggerated shoulders. Then there were great looking trousers. The most ambitious were the pairs with vertical slices down the front that revealed a bold lash of red underneath. On the softer side, a pair of halter dresses ad provocative sheer insets in front and elegant draped backs. The draping and twisting felt new for Do, an expansion of his vocabulary. Sprinkled in were pieces from his Banana Republic collaboration, due in stores on October 10. The khaki trench with a removable shearling collar and a two-in-one chunky ribbed sweater added a more easy-going vibe to the show. Just don’t call them casual. There’s nothing casual about Do’s drive.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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