FASHION FLOCK

Many of the members of this new social set, like the Brandolini sisters (Bianca is an actress, and Coco is a fashion consultant), jewelry designers Repossi and Delettrez Fendi, family-brand ambassador Missoni, and fashion stylist Giovanna Battaglia, are proud Italians, so it comes as no surprise that Rome-born, Paris-based fashion designer Giambattista Valli is the unofficial ringleader. It's a role he's happy to assert. "We started this movement at my very first shows. I wanted to bring a certain freshness to the front row, so I invited all my young friends," Valli says now, championing his godfather status. "Since then, they've become the It girls at all the defiles!"
It's a way of life for these Italian women in Paris, mixing their native va-va-voom with a special blend of French chic or, as Valli describes it, "Italian spontaneous attitude mixed
We haven't seen a tight-knit group like this one since the Miller sisters invaded Europe and began marrying its princes in the'90s
with French couture. Caviar et T-shirt! Pizza et haute couture! They are part of a generation regaining its femininity. They have turned the proportions of their mothers' couture gowns into party dresses."
  Not that this new guard is limited to France's eastern neighbor. Sieber, a fashion stylist, is Austrian; Dellal, who is the founder and face of the successful shoe company Charlotte Olympia, grew up in London, as did Sophia Hesketh, Lord Hesketh's fashion-stylist daughter; Julia Restoin Roitfeld, an art director, and Josephine de La Baume, a singer and actress, were both born and raised in Paris. The Eastern bloc is represented by supermodel Natalia Vodianova, who is seen in the front row more than she is on the catwalk these days, and art-world power player Dasha Zhukova. And this gang's tentacles reach across the Atlantic too: There's Colombian heiressTatianaSanto Domingo; Brazils Alexia Niedzielski, a photo editor; and fashion editors Lauren Santo Domingo and Monroque, both of whom reside in New York City.