“I don’t know that much about fashion but I know that [Prabal Gurung] knows how to make a lady look good,” front row starlet Karen Amanda Seyfried told us after the show. “Everything was wearable.” It was the Big Love star’s first fashion show ever and she picked a good one.

The impossible to miss Nicki Minaj was also front row, though Sarah Jessica Parker–his biggest fan of late–was absent. But if SJP continues with her red carpet devotion to Gurung through spring 2012 she’ll be updating her look with sophisticated, subversively sexy dresses.

I think Gurung’s spring collection was his best so far. It didn’t hurt that the show opened to Liz Phair’s “Flower,” the dirtiest song from Exile in Guyville, one of my favorite albums. The clothes were nuanced, more subtle than his usual bold solid-color Michelle Obama-friendly frocks, and took more risks. He worked with a print maker to cover his lilac colored collection in pixelated floral digital prints. Flouncy flared silk dresses were sexed up with sheer tulle inserts but never crossed the line. The most interesting looks were bound up in delicate rope harnesses (a “corselet” in the line sheets), but I have a feeling it’s the solid colored floor-length numbers that we’ll be seeing come awards show season.

**All images: Imaxtree