The fashion industry has been in a state of flux for some time, searching for inspiration in places obvious ('80s rocker chicks) and less so (normcore anonymity). But few of these attempts at doing something new—many of which felt halfhearted at best—caught fire at the retail level, perhaps because many of the clothes themselves simply lacked the must-have characteristics that compel most women to fork over their credit cards.

But this time around, designers from New York to London, Milan to Paris, delved deep into the '70s and '90s, two decades rich with ideas, and came up with a host of winning shapes: cropped pants, high-neck blouses, midi- and maxidresses, trim pantsuits, and an endless parade of coats of every ilk. That they did so with true originality was the real surprise—retailers were practically jumping out of their seats with excitement at the prospect of a season of bests, greats, and sellouts.

Also surprising: No two designers channeled these eras in remotely the same way. Jack McCollough and Lazaro Hernandez's slashed dresses at Proenza Schouler took their cues from abstract painter Helen Frankenthaler; Alber Elbaz's tiered fringe appliqué and woven tunics rocked the Casbah at Lanvin; and Francisco Costa went rogue altogether, mining the '60s with lean, mod silhouettes at Calvin Klein. A few designers did find common ground:

blue prom dresses

Emporio Armani, Giorgio Armani, Givenchy, and Céline

Both Christopher Peters and Shane Gabier, for their label Creatures of the Wind, and Alessandro Michele, in his first women's show at Gucci, appeared to have Netflixed Wes Anderson's The Royal Tenenbaums. But the season's best movie moment came at Valentino, where Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pierpaolo Piccioli had hilarious hijinks up their medieval-checkerboard-printed sleeve: Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson in full Zoolander mode, down to the "Blue Steel" duck face.

The buzz on the streets of Paris was "Victorian Chola." That's what Riccardo Tisci called his Givenchy collection—leave it to him to masterfully meld seemingly opposed genres into a collection that was at once brooding, seductive, elegant, sexy, and street.

Though powerful, this season's woman is slightly undone—dishabille, as the French aptly put it—and she is hardly lacking in artifice. Much of what was most interesting on the runway involved ornamentation: raw edges, cutouts, grommets, and, at Burberry Prorsum and Baja East, fringe galore. Elsewhere we saw feathers, velvets, tweeds, bouclé wools, and enough lace to employ a whole convent of novitiates— all that, plus the comeback of gloves and brooches. Overindulgence ruled at both Saint Laurent, where Hedi Slimane stuck with his proto-punk vision ('50s rocker chicks by way of an '80s everything-but-the kitchen-sink sensibility), and Céline, where Phoebe Philo showed body-revealing knits and slip dresses, plus tunics and pants appliquéd with exquisitely wrought lace.

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Marni, Max Mara, Missoni, and Christopher Kane

Alexander Wang stayed true to hardcore grunge for his namesake collection while elevating his game at Balenciaga, returning to Cristobál's cocoon shapes and elaborate fabrications with one of his best shows yet. Pastels proved anything but weak: Miuccia Prada played with trim pantsuits in keyed-up hues. And Raf Simons, never one to shy away from color, especially pink, propelled the storied house of Christian Dior forward with slouchy coats and abstract camouflage bodysuits, while also showing nifty tweed pantsuits and A-line flapper skirts with more than a hint of the racy schoolgirl. Kate and Laura Mulleavy of Rodarte served up a different version of that trope: Their pitch-perfect Beverly Hills 90210 schoolgirl— all tweed jackets and leather leggings—morphed into a sea nymph at night in some of the season's most beautiful evening dresses. There were powerful debuts, too: Nadège Vanhee-Cybulski offered a stunning spin on understated basics at Hermès, while at Loewe, fashion's latest wunderkind, Jonathan Anderson, struck gold with cool leather separates that had editors rushing straight to the brand's avenue Montaigne store.

Marc Jacobs used sketches of Diana Vreeland's studio as a backdrop, and his girls—spellbinding and slightly demented-looking in long dresses and Edwardian coats—defied convention in the best of ways, once again securing Jacobs's place in the pantheon of fashion originals. His successor at Louis Vuitton, Nicolas Ghesquière, created a moment befitting the ultimate luxury brand, not only by presenting in three specially constructed geodesic domes (Buckminster Fuller alert!) but by showing fur chubbies, lingerie dressing, and killer slingbacks that give the label both plenty to sell and a jaunty sense of humor. With so much to choose from this fall, the best news for shoppers is that, for the time being at least, designers have moved from chasing trends into a realm of ideas. There's something for everyone, and in fashion, that's never a bad idea.