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I shouldn’t pick favourites, but I’ll do it anyways. Maybe it’s because we share a fondness for all things Victorian, or maybe it’s just because the clothes were that good, but halfway through LG Fashion Week, I was already utterly spellbound by Chloé Comme Parris Spring 2012. After a similarly stellar LG debut last season, sister duo of Chloé and Parris Gordon took us back to the late 1800s, minus the wasp waists and lack of gender equality. “We were really looking at raised necklines and detailing and interesting ways of cinching in a waist or pleating and draping, but looking at how to reduce these silhouettes that can’t really be worn today because they are so voluminous and so ornate,” said sister Chloé when we visited the studio last week. The sisters’ look at the era was apparent, from delicate woven lace-like trousers and jumpers, to the William Morris-like print appearing on several dresses (the finale dress was a dead ringer for a neo-sack dress à la Pre-Raphaelite muse Jane Morris). Updated with interesting cropping (a jean jacket cut just below the collar comes to mind), sexy slits, and cross-body pearl necklaces, it’s without any sort of hometown inhibition that I can honestly say—if there was such a thing as a thousand star rating, this collection would have it. In my books, at least.

Sisters and design partners Chloé and Parris Gordon brought their Chloé Comme Parris label to the LG Fashion Week runway for the first time yesterday afternoon. It was a promising start for the Toronto natives, who already sell their line at two Toronto boutiques. Chloé, who designs the clothing, is a graduate of NSCAD, where Parris, in charge of jewellery, is in her last year.

The clothes were both military- and athletic-inspired–though not too obviously either one. For example, polished brass buttons running up the legs of slouchy sweats.  The cutaway jackets and dresses offered a twist–an olive green utility jacket featured long panel at the back that zipped away–ditto the belts, which were found around the neck of a sleeveless blouse or hanging from the bottom of a cropped baseball jacket. All the cut-outs also offered some flashes of skin in unexpected places. A favourite came from a striped dress whose skirt was attached with metal buttons, partially undone for a peek of the hips.

See a gallery of the Chloé Comme Parris show»

Watch a runway video and an interview with the designers»

Read our full coverage of Toronto Fashion Week»

Following in Atlantic Fashion Week tradition, the first designer showcase of Halifax’s two-night AFW kicked off in the Mercedes-Benz showroom on Kempt Road last Wednesday with work by current students of Nova Scotia College of Art and Design University. Unlike the past, however, their unveiling didn’t whip by with only the ghost of a few key pieces lingering in its wake. Instead, the NSCAD students, their designs rich with imagination and artistry, have completely swallowed my memory of the evening. Our art college, ever strengthening its fashion department, must be doing something right.

Read a round-up of the shows, after the jump.