Styles by Miguel Adrover and Alexander Wang Reflect a World in Flux NEW YORK - "I thought: "How can I lose touch with what is going on? How can I not be affected?"" said Miguel Adrover, bringing his collection piled - literally - with references to a greener and less wasteful world. An emotional show from the designer, back in New York after eight years in his home in Majorca, summed up the opening days of the international women's autumn 2012 season. And it reflected in a dramatic form general changes affecting fashion and society. Designers, showing on their runways a mix-up of winter and summer clothes might say: "How can we talk about seasonal collections when the weather is so chaotic?" Or: "What is American fashion, when my roots are in Asia and my aspirations global?" Those thoughts seemed condensed into a smart collection from Alexander Wang , whose sharp, white-winter look was, in fact, laminated tweed rainwear - one of the many fabrics that the designer said backstage he had developed from scratch. These imaginative materials took the familiar story of American sportswear fast forward. Mr. Wang's sleek, mildly military tailoring, which also came in a deep wine red, contrasted with a seductive, fitted, leather-and-silk draped dress. The casual, downtown element of street style in the designer's work has become more sophisticated, even including slender cocktail dresses with white fringing inspired by shaved fur. Tension came from mesh masks covering the mouth, which the models pulled down as they stood in front of mirrored pillars on the catwalk, revealing themselves as iconic figures, led by Gisele Bündchen. What a pity that murky lighting subdued the effect! The "magic carpets" - ethnic rugs - strewn across the Altuzarra show space were a metaphor for the world traveler, that stylish woman who can dangle a Moroccan coin necklace around her waist but make it look as chic as patterned Indian jodhpurs with knee-high boots. "I was looking at my French roots - what is proper, bourgeois French style," said Joseph Altuzarra, although the essence of the show was in the mixing, like a tailored blue suit with a pleat-front skirt and a sweater with ethnic bobbles under a jacket. The concept of tailoring, often with military gilded buttons, laced with the ethnic (and even a horse's head pattern) made for a collection that would have seemed stronger if it had been tightly edited. At the Miguel Adrover show, the greenery apparently growing out of clothing, dresses fashioned out of tea towels, T-shirts or bomber jackets and models throwing bank notes on the runway made for more than a recycling statement. The designer, who lived in New York throughout the 1990s to 2004, seemed to have wrapped his soul in these clothes, which included pieces designed with Hessnatur, the German ecological and organic clothes line, where Mr. Adrover has found a fashion home. The designer called the collection "Out of My Mind." Yet the clothes were powerful for their sensibility to the churning world: the Egyptian Revolution as a simple dress made from a beach towel printed with the mask of Tutankhamen; a burka reworked as a top; a ribbed dress made from an Alexander McQueen leather coat; or outfits created with his great-grandmother's nightdress or from the American flag. Mr. Adrover imagined the show as a travel bag of clothes ejected from a plane flying over the Amazon, worn by people with no reference point on the origin, use or status of their finds. The result was a collection that was apolitical, yet throbbed with a sense of global upheaval. New York fashion has been fed by designers with varied cultural origins who have enriched a familiar sportswear look. From Prabal Gurung , born in Singapore and raised in Nepal, came a selection from graphic capes, short and drawn on the curve, to sleek black dresses with sheer panel inserts. Before an ending of fancy gowns, a fine passage had tailored clothes glowing like blue-green oil spills, with foil-printed Neoprene panels. They gave an otherworldly effect to the simple styles and shone out in the collection. The Band of Outsiders went down Mexico way, producing prairie dresses with tiny floral prints that recalled early Ralph Lauren. The designer Scott Sternberg is smart to grasp that world travelers are not compelled to dress for the weather on the Brooklyn streets. But when the floor-sweeping dresses had been replaced by tailored jackets over soft pants, the clothes seemed more in line with the sporty men's wear, presented on the same runway. Rachel Zoe made her metamorphosis from Hollywood überstylist to fashion designer (via how-to-do-it books and reality TV) a family affair. Her father, husband, sister, nanny and baby son Skyler watched the parade of Swinging London looks updated with the idea: "What if Mick Jagger had been a girl?" She/he (for Bianca Jagger and her Studio 54 days crept in, too) wore taut jackets and skinny flared pants with floaty or silken long dresses, adding a flavor of hippie-de-luxe. As in her career, so on the runway: Ms. Zoe's show looked like a how-to manual brought to life with just the right bag/show/jewel to compliment the look - but nothing to take fashion much further forward than 1973. Lacoste has a heritage not just on the tennis court, but to skiwear that goes back to the French ski team in 1966, photographed by the magazine Paris Match in roll-necked tops and stretch ski pants. With that "click" of inspiration, Felipe Oliveira Baptista, Lacoste's artistic director since 2010, moved the look to the 21st century, using stretch fabrics and geometrically patterned sweaters to make a dynamic, androgynous look that was part ski slope and part sci-fi. Just as the ski style seemed to have reached a plateau, the designer introduced another element: a tweed check pattern that went back to men's wear in the 1930s. The concept of sportswear, with modern fabrics and fashion attitude, made for a powerful show to send Lacoste schussing into the 21st century.