simple couture that could be produced

Italian fashion's raison d'etre has always been wearable luxury, ever since plucky young things like Emilio Pucci first made their way across the Atlantic in the mid-20th century to provide an international market with chic, simple couture that could be produced and bought at a fraction of Parisian prices.

Last week in Milan, the country's top fashion houses stayed true to this heritage. Okay, okay, not everyone is going to be able to pull off – or afford – one of Gucci's bright purple furs, Prada's roomy python jackets or Dolce & Gabbana's bedazzling golden evening gowns (luxury comes with a capital "L" for autumn/winter 2011/12, by the way), but it seems likely that a lot of people will want to. And why? Because it all just seemed fun, plain and simple – high-end without being too high concept, upmarket but not too uptight. In fact, a lot of the collections seemed to have a sense of optimism, colour and freshness that is more characteristic of the spring/summer season – take the D&G show, for example, possibly the most youthful, fluorescent and irreverent collection that Stefano Gabbana and Domenico Dolce have produced in years. Or Angela Missoni's offering – a bright pastel paean to leisurely outdoorsiness, replete with what looked like suede and snake wellies. Of course this is Milan so, like it or lump it, there was a huge amount of fur. But, moral problems aside, even the most extravagant of these were far from heavy or dowdy. Karl Lagerfeld stuffed his full of glitter at Fendi. Gucci seemed to go twice round the rainbow in mink. Add a sense of cinematic mystery – Emporio Armani did spies, Gucci did femme fatale, the Jil Sander girls could have been female Bond villains – a pretty thrilling first foot into the new season.

All over Milan runways, designers played with eye-grabbing clashes of texture, colour and mood, both in looks and individual pieces. The first evidence of this was at Fendi, where what looked like a wall-sized collage of papery swatches formed the backdrop for a collection that was all about unexpected mixtures and chic assemblage. Voluminous coats, gathered daintily at the elbow, looked as if they'd been assembled from a series of disparate elements, garnished as they were with coloured patches, false lapels, piping, shawl necks and unexpected cutaways. At Bottega Veneta, Tomas Maier was also playing a sartorial Frankenstein. Commenting that designing his 1960s-tinged but undoubtedly forward-looking winter collection "was like being in a laboratory" he did his best to create some sublime mismatches of textile, pattern and style. Fur and nylon met on an oversized, amber-coloured parka; spidery prints in deep yellow, green and orange vied against each other in clashing twinsets; delicate, neutral silk blouses were paired with mottled orange suits in a blotchy, thick wool weave. At Salvatore Ferragamo, Massimiliano Giornetti also got his clash on, playing with classic menswear textiles – houndstooth, pinstripe, woven wool – by setting them against each other (and black and white leopard print) in composite dresses and mix-and-match suiting. Meanwhile at Dolce & Gabbana – a superbly entertaining, surprisingly youthful show in which masculine tailoring and star prints were the defining elements – the designers proudly proclaimed that "clothes and accessories are mixed almost randomly, with no rules".