NEW YORK, Feb 13, 2001/ --- This season's Marc Jacobs was a crowd pleaser, where the designer rose to a new level of sophistication and coherence.

Jacobs, who notoriously prompted the (happily brief) grunge trend and who has a known weakness for rambling presentations, staged a highly-focused, fast-paced catwalk show that will inspire many magazine shoots and endless copying by fashion pirates.

Jacobs designs for individualists and there was no shortage of them in the downtown Armory for his show: Hilary Swank; Donald Trump and outlandishly leggy Melania Knauss; Tori Spelling; designer buddy Marc Jacobs; lens woman Kelly Klein and a frequently-vocal Sandra Bernhard.

The show was a little dowdy at the start, with lumpy, boiled twill coats and suits with big buttons that did, admittedly, recall our old enemy the thrift shop. But their flattering cut and easy, ironic attitude made it all work.

Jacobs' big idea this season was playing with transparency in georgette and whisper-thin cashmere. These will be bestsellers. Marc also showed delicate dresses with trompe l'oeil detailing and edgy jersey dresses that were extremely pretty.

It didn't all work. Some of the outfits were faintly foolish like barathea dresses with liquid gold collars. Others - bunny fur coats and oddly printed slips - seemed designed to be worn in the funeral scene of an Italian surrealist movie.

But overall, this was an assured and decidedly modern collection by a designer whose four years with the French house of Louis Vuitton have helped polish his talent and hone his sense of style.

As the lightning-fast show ended, the crowd rose to its feet in thunderous applause and Jacobs trotted out, all smiles. But few beamed more than Yves Carcelle, Louis Vuitton's president and the LVMH honcho who oversees the conglomerate's ten fashion houses.

"Marc's turned into a very mature designer. We couldn't be happier with him," Carcelle. That's for sure.

Marc Jacobs

Marc Jacobs

Marc Jacobs

Marc Jacobs