Playful gender-bending at the Paris fashion shows

PARIS (AP) - Blurring the lines between the masculine and feminine is as old as Shakespeare.

Wednesday's fashion week previews in Paris - the second of eight days on the spring-summer 2013 calendar - showed that, over the centuries, playful gender-bending has lost none of its creative allure.

Dries Van Noten, who cut his teeth as a men's designer in Antwerp, produced the day's strongest show, mixing traditional menswear cuts with his own floral signature in a harmonious play on colour.

Damir Doma, meanwhile, who also trained in Antwerp, fused masculine-tinged Cossack gear, martial arts dress and buckles alongside more feminine touches.