Fashion: Going for Gold

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Just as happens in the Olympics, where a star comes along and does something quite different from anything seen before, every so often a designer will, for no apparent reason, show something completely out of synch with everything else. In Milan, that designer is usually Miuccia Prada. After several seasons of staying on the groomed slopes, she likes to veer off piste. This season Prada showed a collection as unexpected as it was aggressive. Her models came storming down the winding runway in oversize nylon anoraks and long, slouched-on black coats worn over heavy knit dresses and chunky platform shoes. There were patches of fur down the backs of wool coats, done in such an offhand way as to almost look primitive. Even some of the shoes had fur on the platform heels. The designer said the collection had been inspired by street fashion, Japanese samurai and medieval soldiers. Backstage after the show she called the mood "angry and savage." Then she smiled. Prada knows that to win at the fashion game, designers have to constantly reinvent the rules.