Uma Thurman steals limelight at Louis Vuitton

PARIS - A picture tells a thousand words, and the story at Louis Vuitton on Sunday was the presence of Uma Thurman, who is staring from billboards worldwide as the face of the French label's new advertising campaign.

The luminous actress, accompanied by her boyfriend, trendy hotelier Andre Balasz, made the most remarked entrance of the season to wolf-whistles from the photographers' pit.

Dressed in an ivory silk ribbed coat and blue jeans, she gracefully responded by smiling and waving, and spent the next few minutes bathing in the glow of flashbulbs as the assorted snappers blithely ignored other celebrity guests.

After that, it was almost hard to concentrate on the clothes American designer Marc Jacobs sent out on the catwalk.

This season, they felt like a mere backdrop to myriad new handbags the company puts out every season. Ready-to-wear only accounts for a small fraction of profits at Louis Vuitton, the jewel in the crown of luxury group LVMH.

The label's new money-spinners include leather quilted monogram bags and tiny sequinned purses in wintry shades of russet, garnet and moss lined with black mink.

Jacobs and his team traditionally work from "mood boards", pasting up assorted images as inspiration for the collection.

This season, they might have included the vintage New Look that Christian Dior launched in 1947, when the end of fabric rationing allowed women once more to wear full skirts.

Its influence was palpable in a green houndstooth tweed coat with billowing sleeves overlaid with dusty blue organza and cinched in at the waist.

Jacobs also reprised the full volumes he showed for his own label in New York, with taffeta opera coats embroidered with rosettes or a pleated green bustier dress with a bubble back.

"It was magnificent, I thought it was strong and just absolutely handsome, gorgeous, chic," actress Selma Blair told Reuters as she headed backstage to congratulate the designer.

The right picture can spell jackpot for a label without the advertising clout of Vuitton.

When Hilary Swank accepted her Oscar for best actress last Sunday, it was a publicity windfall for Guy Laroche, the label that made her elegant navy gown with the plunging back.

The dusty French label is undergoing a revival at the hands of Herve Leroux, better known to fashion mavens as Herve Leger, the purveyor of clingy bandage dresses to supermodels like Cindy Crawford in the 1990s.

He lost the right to use his name after selling his label in 1998. But the designer still has a knack for creating skintight eveningwear guaranteed to make a red carpet entrance.

In his second collection for Laroche on Sunday, he showed a sequin-encrusted red halterneck gown with a vest back, or a black chiffon long-sleeved gown that draped around the waist before fanning out into a long train.

Celebrity stylists, take note.

- REUTERS