PARIS, February 21, 2004/ FW/ --- The day after the end of the Milan Womenswear Show, the Paris Ready-To-Wear season starts. For the fashion flock, it means leaving Milan on Monday evening to be in time for the 9:30 AM show of Isabelle Ballu.

As always, Paris has a traditional line up of shows - Chanel, Christian Lacroix, Christian Dior, Jean-Paul Gaultier and Helmut Lang, to name a few.

Notable this season is the return of Balenciaga to the Paris official calendar. The venerable fashion house showed in New York for a few seasons. But for Fall 2004, Balenciaga is back in Paris.

Also notable this season is that the first day is dedicated to emerging designers, a tradition that the Chambre Syndicale, France's fashion governing body started last October.

But don't be fooled with the term, "emerging designers" because the first day has an impressive line up - Jean-Paul Knott, Dice Kayek, Sharon Wauchob, Andrew GN, and Gaspard Yurkeivich.

With the U.S. economy in the upswing, expect this unexpected for the Fall 2004 season, as Paris designers woo back the U.S. in the luxury market.