娱乐英语新闻:Couture alive and vibrant in Paris

Worth - a resuscitated house founded in 1858 - served up more of the tutus that have become its hallmark since it resumed its couture line last year. Its Italian designer, Giovanni Bedin, said he'd taken his inspiration from the house's "night and day" costume - an 1880 ball gown embroidered with the symbols, insects and animals of day and nighttime.

Haute couture returned to its roots on Wednesday with a Jean Paul Gaultier show that swapped the usual booming sound track for a disembodied voice that read the name, number and a brief description of each look - just as it was done during couture's postwar heyday.

The painstaking craftsmanship that in part justifies astronomical price tags was on bold display at Frank Sorbier. The Frenchman injected the street wear of Lower East Side Manhattanites and Plains Indian women with a stiff dose of Parisian chic.

Valentino sent out a whisper-light collection of transparent, lace-and-chiffon dresses with an easy, breezy elegance, and many of the models wore chokers made from see-through plastic butterflies.

Lebanese designer Elie Saab continued his assault on red-carpets worldwide with another collection of tasteful gowns doused with flashbulb-friendly sparkle.