Let's play make-believe. Just imagine yourself, your wife, girlfriend, mother, or mistress, as one of those rare women blessed with the wealth and social life required to indulge a splurge on haute

couture . . . exactly the type of woman who has flown into Paris this week by private jet, and is

at present holed up in a suite at the Ritz.

Her time is not her own,

what with her rigorous schedule of facials, manicures, runway shows, luncheons, cocktail soirees, and dinners. Then there are those all-important salon appointments at each of her favoured couture houses, where long-suffering vendeuses will help her choose the perfect frocks for summer's social spin.

The super-rich are in Paris this week to shop. But there's nothing cash'n'wrap about couture's painstakingly handmade-to-order clothes. Each selection will generally require a considered re-interpretation, then a succession of fittings over a period of several

weeks. Committed clients

may insist that nothing feels quite like these exquisitely- crafted creations.

But it's a costly and time-

consuming way of acquiring a fashion abstraction of perfection.

In haute couture, far too many multi-million-franc frocks are chasing far too few potential clients. Every poor little rich bitch must therefore be utterly spoiled for choice. Should she favour a house which spe-

cialises in discreet luxury - clothes which look chic yet unremarkable to the untrained eye? Or should she board a flight of couture fantasy, revelling in a piece of outlandish creativity? Does she crave nothing more than an occasional admiring glance? Or does she never feel properly dressed unless strangers point her out - and guffaw.

Women who love clothes must find haute couture rather like lifting the lid on the ultimate chocolate box. The options are so rich, so deliciously tempting, so wickedly indulgent - it must be all but impossible to narrow them down. Some clients don't even bother; couture's erstwhile super-shopper, Mouna al Ayoub, once famously loved a Chanel haute-couture show so much

that she ordered the entire collection: yes, every last tweed suit, cocktail dress, and evening gown of it.

Some couture clients

find themselves perfectly suited in Oscar de la Renta's polished but pedes-trian work for Balmain. Though hardly the couture world's equivalent of the bargain basement, Balmain is far from the most expensive of houses. Yet, despite the best efforts of its skilled craftspeople, Balmain seems the perfect choice for any woman who would prefer no-one realised she'd squandered ten-grand on a frock. There was certainly no outward clue that such ensembles as the black lace bolero, with

its matching white lace sheath dress, would cost the same as a nice family-sized hatchback.

Casual onlookers might more readily marvel at the technical wizardry of the featherlight frocks shown this week by Emanuel Ungaro. Models wandered around a magical garden set, which included full-sized trees, a spectacular cascade, and

a Charlie Dimmock-type water feature. Apart from some midriff-baring

hooded bra-tops, the clothes seemed fairly magical too - wisps of filmy fabrics, seamlessly blown about the body in a gentle caress.

The intense, neon-bright colour palette seemed bold, but never vulgar. And those invisible construction tricks - unachievable in

factory-made clothing - were examples of couture at its most pure.

The real master of couture, how-ever, is still Yves Saint Laurent. The massive 105-outfit

collection which he showed yesterday reminded everyone exactly who, in couture terms,

is still The Boss.

No-one comes close to the illusion of effortlessness which characterises his work. You sense it in the clean, beguilingly simple lines of his daytime tailoring - which this season offered a silhouette reminiscent of the forties . . . the sensual quality of an evening gown poured across the body from just one shoulder . . . the unexpected jollity of bright tutti-

frutti motifs scattered across white organdie eveningwear . . . the utterly infallible use of colour. It all adds up to a compelling suggestion of how a rich woman might care to dress. And it makes most of the couture competition look laboured and rather unlovable.

Of course, some couture devotees want a much more look-at-me sort of statement for their money. Yet, even frontline fashion freaks, while enraptured by the creative delirium of John Galliano's latest cartoon-like Wonder Woman image for Christian Dior, must be praying that the vendeuses back at Dior's

elegant salons on Avenue Montaigne will be able to offer them something even vaguely wearable. They certainly could not have spotted it amid the fashion insanity on the Dior runway.

Galliano has turned Dior shows into the stuff of divine madness - utterly unforgettable spectacles which burnish brightly the name of the house, imbuing its handbags, fragrances, and beauty products with a new desirability. But, know what? His runway collections now have nothing whatsoever to do with how any woman is ever going to dress.

Christian Lacroix's passion for clashing colours and challenging silhouettes results in bold, daring, and downright difficult clothes which are fundamentally unsuited to life's shrinking violets. Never more so, methinks, than this season's collection - which would demand a wearer every bit as brave and capricious as its originator.

Yet it's hard not to marvel at Lacroix's daredevil disdain for prevailing fashion logic or short-term trends - and hard not to be captivated by the spiky irreverence of his quixotic taste. So let's forgive the sparkly daffodil yellow crochet pyjama outfit, and concentrate instead on his fabulous white satin shirt-dress, the ravishing evening dress inset with pleats of coloured satin, and his utterly glorious bridal gown.

Any wealthy woman who craves an accommodation between discreet luxury and

creativity should be hot-footing along to Chanel in Rue Cambon. Karl Lagerfeld's latest fusion of the great Chanel heritage with his own uncanny appreciation of what women might want right now made a truly splendid show.

For a fresh take on Chanel's famous garcon look, Lagerfeld juxtaposed frivolous evening skirts with relatively simple short-sleeved blouses - plus a mannish necktie. The jacket-fronts of Chanel's signature tweed suits were replaced

with pleated satin - or reworked as blousons.

Boaters were worn over veiled foreheads; dainty matching bags, many no bigger than a mobile phone case, dangled from pastel-painted finger nails.

Shoes? Utterly flat, round-

toe pumps. And this being Chanel, every other outfit was loaded down with long ropes

of gently-coloured pearls or semi-precious stones. In this world of make-believe, it was

an easy fashion act to swallow. Well, whatever made you think that truly great couture clothes would never pass a

reality check?