There's no question that John Galliano left Maison Margiela on a high note ... The original look was created by combining several layers of masks while using hairdryers and even airbrush machines.

One of its effects was to focus attention on the clothes themselves, created by a team and credited to Maison Martin Margiela, aka MMM. And what intriguing clothes they were: Recall, for instance ...

With its sparse walls, exposed pipes, and undressed mannequins, Maison Martin Margiela looks more like a working artist’s loft than the New York outpost of a major Belgian designer. Staff in ...