Oscar De La Renta loves a strong woman. Each season he reiterates his appreciation for women that know what they want and know how to get it. His sincere devotion to a certain ideal of womanhood gives him an almost uncanny ability to hit the high points of an emerging cultural moment with his garments. Thus his Fall 2008 collection contains nearly every major trend for the fall season including opulent detailing, lean tailoring, layered textures, and color-of-the moment plum. And while the rest of the world is focused on another cultural moment we find ourselves completely mesmerized by Oscar's world. Oscar's laughing, confident, penetrating and, dare we say it, strong woman exemplifies our hope for a world in which substance matches style. And while we here at Coutorture feel quite privileged to be tackling these challenges a little early with the Fall 2008 garments featured in our editorial we expect the rest of fashion will have caught up by September. But by then Oscar De La Renta will have prepared yet another vision of womanhood for us. Proving that to be be truly strong one must always be a little bit ahead of the pack.

Peter Som, Zac Posen, and Phillip Lim did it too, the streamlined magpie. Perhaps one of the most interesting visions during New York Fashion Week was that of layered texture. Layering and texture, two relatively ambiguous terms, combined this Fashion Week as an exercise in personality. As for layering, it's mostly the sort of slouchy-chic Americana aesthetic, which appears season after season, and as for texture, the ability of technology, art, and architecture to inspire the most innovative textiles (or at least, those reimagined through pairing). The Oscar de la Renta Fall 2008 collection gave us one of the best examples of this theme. A buttery soft plum leather skirt with tulle overlay was paired with a cashmere knit sweater in purples and greens. The mixture of these fabrics, the layering employed, was delivered seamlessly. Never has magpie been so streamlined.