positivelyBLEAK Grinning back into the abyss.

NYFW: Bleakest Picks (Part I)

I love Fashion Week, but I’ve never been. (Well, I was once in NYC during it, but my accom­plice and I mostly loi­tered out­side and dealt with the fallout in the street — in no way does screaming “KAAARL!!” with a mouthful of Papaya King at the tents count as attending. It does, how­ever, get you checked out by the local beat cops, so don’t!) That doesn’t stop me from glazing over every time Fashion Week cov­erage showed on TV…and there’s some real joy to be found in dig­ging through photos of the col­lec­tions while in your pajamas!

Runway fashion is actu­ally a lot more in tune with my own weird style sense; designers can take much bigger risks when designing for the runway than they can designing for retail. I love an extreme, and a pleas­antly recur­ring theme this time around had designers “tough­ening up” their col­lec­tions. (Not to men­tion that metal influ­ence has been creeping into style for some time now…) Below is a quick run­down of what I loved to see strutted down the cat­walk. Click the thumb­nails for big-​making!

Isaac Mizrahi con­trasts sheer layers with tough, straight­for­ward struc­ture. I love the quilted leather, hitched skirts, and woodsy greens…and oh, that gold dress!

I am a known sucker for any­thing with a big, dra­matic drape to it, so Paris68’s selec­tion was right up my alley. Fitted, angular biker jackets, mega-​monochrome and end­less trains? YES THANK YOU:

Ralph Lauren — not usu­ally a favorite of mine, but he won me over here — made velvet look awe­some, and paired it with great decon­structed sheers and over­sized soft knits. I really like the froufy, full skirts paired with util­i­tarian tops, the rocker belts every­where, and that slink-​tastic Morticia Addams dress:

William Rast’s col­lec­tion is my number-​one favorite of the week. It’s all like glo­ri­ously luxe, updated 90s grunge. I would wear every single thing he sent down the runway:

So who else fol­lowed the FW cov­erage? What did you like, what did you hate? Keep your eyes peeled, there’s more of my hand-​picked Fashion Week favorites coming in on Thursday!

(Photo credit goes to GettyImages.)