WHO WILL BE THE NEXT BIG THING?

That’s the question that perennially fuels the rave of creativity, stitchery and circus nerves that is the New York Fashion Week now on the catwalk. It’s the tease that attracts designers, buyers, editors, photographers, stylists, models, bookers, trend forecasters, sharp-tongued blogosphere sibyls and strung-out accountants. It’s the dream we all dream.

The United States remains the world’s largest market for fashion, and New York is the centre of the global fashion image machine. The assembly line keeps cranking; the maw must be fed. But who will do it? What’s immediately apparent is that while fashion is healthily supplied with journeymen, there is no obvious genius in sight.

This is not to suggest that New York is suffering from talent shortfall. There’s the team of Proenza Schouler, who make middle-of-the-road design seem indie and cool. There are pop cultural gadflies like Isaac Mizrahi, and chaste classicists like Francisco Costa at Calvin Klein. We have elder statesmen Oscar de la Renta and Ralph Lauren. And we have Miguel Adrover, the man who captured the imagination of the fashion establishment with clothes made from a recycled mattress and Yankees caps.

In a lot of ways, the life and career of Saint Laurent are helpful in understanding why it is futile and also probably dumb to sit around waiting for his avatar. “That world is gone,” his former partner Pierre Berge said days...