Prada's fall collection for spring

If Miuccia Prada was a fish, she would be a salmon, swimming upstream. So against the tide of fashion is Mrs Prada that whatever is currently in vogue, you can say with some certainty that she will produce its opposite.

This show turned its back on this season's embellished, highly decorated look for something simpler and pared back. The first clue came from the catwalk, which meandered like a river and was painted with fish similar to ancient cave drawings. The second clue came from the models' skin, slicked with water as though they had just risen from the sea.

All the clothes were tied in rudimentary fashion, as though they hailed from an era before zips and hooks had been invented. Calf-length pencil skirts came with elasticated waists or a drawstring. Shrunken jackets had no fasteners except a tie at the neck; dresses had wide neck apertures with a bow at the side. Open backs on fine gauge cashmere jumpers were tied with cotton strings like hospital gowns.

The hospital theme was echoed by the little socks worn under each vertiginous snakeskin stiletto sandal, not dissimilar to those found on surgeons in an operating theatre. Sadly, they made walking so tricky that more than one model tumbled off her heels.

Most fabrics were self-coloured. But their plainness belied their technical wizardry, for Prada explained backstage that many designs incorporated metal seams allowing the pencil skirts and shrunken jackets to sit stiffly away from the body, and also lent the fabrics a crumpled look. From a distance, they looked like simple crushed cotton - but, as always with Prada, all was not quite as it seemed.

"I wanted to go back to something primitive," she said. "I was searching for what counts, what really matters. I wanted to clean things up and make them simple."

"Primitive" it may have been, but this was another standout collection from a woman who often makes the rest of Milan feel staid.