Kenzo gets the buzz at bee-themed Paris Fashion Week show

PARIS (AP) — A hybrid Paris Fashion Week continued Wednesday featuring a stand out live runway show from socially-distanced Kenzo, but no sign of any A-list celebrities.

Here are some highlights:

KENZO GETS ALL THE BUZZ

Kenzo’s show was a fairy story in nature. Guests smiled as they breathed in the fresh air of the inner city garden amid the sounds of the frothing fountain.

Large umbrellas placed among the rose bushes marked out the show “seating,” little wooden stools, that ensured a safe distance between them. Many traipsed in bleary-eyed to this morning show, and were happy to discover a pot of honey on each stool. The “Honey of Montmartre,” which guests read off the honey pot label as the show got off to a tardy start, is the stuff produced near the Sacre Coeur church as part of a city-wide initiative to revive the dwindling bee population.

For Felipe Oliveira Baptista, the bees were more than a show gimmick, and the sweetness not just in the pots -- it was to be found also in the creative, bee-themed designs.

The designer used the Kenzo touchstone of the safari or the trek, and reinterpreted the sand dust visor as a netted beekeeper’s mask. On one of the first looks, the sheer fabric of the headwear was held with a large floppy hat. In clever creative play, Oliveira Baptista evoked a camouflage effect using printed vermilion flowers. Colors were eye-popping, either prime or acid and the silhouette was tight and sporty, or flowing and diaphanous.

The collection was also defined by shape. One look featured a netted visor in peach yellow that fell straight down from the round hat in a column tube shape, and shoes were geometric sandals with soles made of the bubbles shapes that evoked the inner lining of a beehive.

THE ECO-INVITE

It took perhaps a...