COMPLETE COLLECTION

PARIS, January 23, 2012

By Nicole Phelps

Bouchra Jarrar is a big talent who prefers the small gesture. The ready-to-wear collection she showed at the Musée Bourdelle put in sharp relief the frivolousness of some of the haute couture paraded elsewhere today. Sounding a lot like Phoebe Philo, another smart woman designer who's made sharp tailoring the defining aspect of her work, Jarrar called her new offering a "continuation of the wardrobe, of the story I've been telling since the beginning."

The designer's focus, as always, was on cut. Trousers were at once stricter through the hips and fuller through the legs than they were last season, and jackets had a more masculine swagger, thanks to double-breasted silhouettes, bolder shoulders, and brass military buttons. On the other hand, a pair of backless gilets—one in fox and the other in black-tipped white feathers—were all femme. Jarrar latched on to snoods; in fur and stripe knits, the circular scarves accessorized sleeveless coat-dresses, as well as simple coats.

But the real news for this label was prints—a contemporary woman's wardrobe isn't complete without them, after all. Jarrar has never used them on the runway before, so she started off subtle, draping a silk floral wallpaper motif into a soft shirtdress and a wrap gown. We can already picture the bow-front blouse in the deep-forest-green print taking root in the front rows next season.

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