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Alber Elbaz: The craftsman
Like Pilati, master craftsman Alber Elbaz did a spell at Yves Saint Laurent, but then the aforementioned Ford installed himself at the helm of the label in his place. At the time, the Israeli-born designer was so overwhelmed that he disappeared for a year, only to emerge at what might go down in history as his spiritual home, the privately owned Lanvin.
The Lanvin womenswear collection is now a favourite with any well-dressed fashion editor or model one might care to mention – think quite the finest little black cocktail dresses and a mean line in trench coats. His menswear is gathering momentum too, also boasting a slightly frayed around the edges but discreet luxury that is both commercially viable and fresh. Elbaz himself, a self-deprecating soul never knowingly spotted without a bow tie, is one of the most popular figures in contemporary fashion. The fact that, in a shark-infested world, he appears quite as loveable as his designs only adds to the charm of this increasingly influential label.
Rei Kawakubo: The iconoclast
The high priestess of avant-garde fashion as the founder of Comme des Garçons, Kawakubo has single-handedly overturned modern codes of dress. The transformation of familiar garments into something entirely different, boiled wool, androgyny, even the colour black all owe any current popularity to this fashion superpower, who continues to challenge our preconceptions of what is and isn't wearable season after season.
Kawakubo's fashion is closely scrutinised by every other working designer, to the point where citing her as inspiration is entirely acceptable. This is all the more remarkable given that her recent offerings have included scratchy dresses covered in pompoms and Mickey Mouse ears.
This November, Kawakubo is the designer collaborating with high-street giant H&M, which will bring her more classic designs to a less fashion knowledgeable customer – although hardcore Comme devotees will no doubt find themselves queuing up to buy them too.
Martin Margiela: The invisible man
Margiela has never agreed to a face-to-face interview nor been photographed by the press – indeed his anti-marketing stance goes a long way towards defining him. The New York Times's style magazine recently argued that Margiela's elusive personality made his designs easier for his contemporaries to reference.
Celebrating its 20th anniversary in womenswear and 10th in menswear this year, Maison Martin Margiela started life at the end of the 1980s and its lo-fi approach to clothing (reworking found pieces, reversing darts, putting frayed edges proudly on display) were a gentle but potent reaction to power-dressing if ever there was one.
The company is currently expanding rapidly in partnership with Renzo Rosso of the denim company Diesel, but that hasn't reduced its integrity or indeed popularity with every designer, fashion editor and stylist worth mentioning, all of whom wear it.
Vivienne Westwood: The national treasure
The queen of punk, the grande dame of British fashion, Vivienne Westwood is a national institution. And rightly so, as if any name embodies the iconoclastic and make-do-and-mend spirit of young British fashion, it must surely be hers. Westwood is as proudly political and brilliantly outspoken as she is innovative, taking little notice of what other designers are up to in favour of following her own interests, which are tied up with the British tailoring tradition, youth culture and French 18th-century painting in equal measures.
For years, Westwood's idiosyncratic persona detracted from her impact as a serious fashion force, but that is no longer the case. Like Comme des Garçons, Westwood has changed the face of contemporary fashion. It's small wonder, with this in mind, that her archive is referenced by so many of her contemporaries.
Karl Lagerfeld: The icon
Karl Lagerfeld is not only our greatest living couturier, he also has an appetite for youth culture that is insatiable and, indeed, admirable – we all know about his iPod collection and that he slimmed down to a shadow of his former monumental self to fit into jeans designed by his fashionable young friend, Hedi Slimane. As designer of the Chanel label for over a quarter of a century, Lagerfeld could so easily bask in the sunlight of former glories but ' he's too restlessly energised a character for that. He's involved in book publishing, promotes young musicians, shoots his own ad campaigns and his persona is as iconic as the French fashion institution he presides over. This is, then, the original multitasking renaissance designer setting the standard for generations to come.
John Galliano: The artist
When the young British designer John Galliano was appointed creative director at the house of Christian Dior in 1996, the publicity that sprang up around the move was unprecedented. The visionary LVMH chief executive Bernard Arnault couldn't have wished for more. Here was Galliano, the Gibraltan-born son of a south London plumber, heading up a legendary name so steeped in the French bourgeois fashion tradition that the move seemed nothing short of blasphemous. How wrong any of the designer's detractors were.
With Wagnerian audacity, Galliano breathed new life into not only Dior, but the haute-couture schedule in general, and his singular and uncompromising vision has been the high point of the most rarefied of fashion calendars ever since. This designer, who shot to fashion fame in the mid-1980s but struggled for more than a decade to make ends meet, is fashion's showman par excellence, and this theatrical approach is applied to Dior as well as his own womenswear line and his relatively new and ground-breaking menswear line.
Dior continues to expand – the latest addition to the line-up is a mobile phone – and, outside of Dior, Galliano's own main ready-to-wear line is also in the ascendant, with a first fragrance scheduled for later this year.
Alexander McQueen: The visionary
McQueen's vision has always been darker than Galliano's, but this designer, too, has been responsible for some of the greatest shows in fashion history: McQueen has created Perspex catwalks showered with rain and others that burst into flames; and he has required models to skate around a larger-than-life-size snowstorm or stalk the world's most glamorous padded cell.
Since the early 1990s, when the Savile Row-trained designer graduated and the late Isabella Blow famously bought his entire degree collection, McQueen has been the subject of controversy, but that belies both the clarity of his vision and the beauty of his work.
On a street level, the scandalous "bumster" trouser that he pioneered 15 years ago led to the revival of the low-slung hipsters that have been worn ever since. Meanwhile, a spell as creative director at Givenchy gave him access to the French haute-couture ateliers, which gave his work a refinement that continues to develop and now, owned by the Gucci Group (it has a 51 per cent share of his company) McQueen heads up his own brand, which announced profitability for the first time earlier this year.
Jean Paul Gaultier: The rebel
Conical bras, men in skirts, couture crafted in everyday fabrics from camouflage to distressed denim... Now that other designers have assimilated Jean Paul Gaultier's gender-bending, frisky and witty take on fashion, it is all too easy to forget it has its roots here.
Not only is Gaultier's persona larger than life – there was a time when he was probably the most famous fashion designer in the world – he is also the last traditionally trained French-born couturier. When he was overlooked for the top job at Dior in the mid-1990s (John Galliano landed the role instead), he set up his own haute-couture house, which is today a refreshingly contemporary counterpoint to the still mainly frilly and bourgeois designs that otherwise dominate.
Donatella Versace: The glamour puss
Nobody knew, following Gianni Versace's murder in 1997, whether his little sister, Donatella, would be able to step into his shoes. This, after all, was Italy's king of glamour, a highly cultured fashion giant whose baroque aesthetic was beloved by every celebrity from Madonna to – but of course! – Elizabeth Hurley. Versace, it is said, invented the supermodel phenomenon, paying exorbitant fees to have not just one famously beautiful face model in his shows, but them all. His high-camp and even more decadent ad campaigns shot by, among others, Richard Avedon and Bruce Weber, equally set the standard for every other designer.
Donatella's approach, while still based on statement dressing, is relatively restrained and more likely to be inspired by music and film. Andafter a few wobbly years, she is back on track (as are the figures at this family-run business), dressing the beautiful people.
Helmut Lang: The absent friend
There are those working within the fashion industry who feel positively bereft since Helmut Lang took leave of his own label in 2005, creating a yawning gap in the Paris schedule. Lang's brand of resolutely metropolitan style – which touched everything from his dark, skinny tailoring to the way models, male and female, positively stormed around his ground-level catwalk, looking fit for real as well as fashion life – presented an unusually inspirational view of contemporary humanity that remains unsurpassed. The looks he came up with in the late 1990s in particular are busily informing other people's collections just now – from Karl Lagerfeld's signature label to Gap. His ad campaigns from that period were equally ground-breaking, not least because they eschewed the presence of anything so banal as a stitch of clothing.
So what is the designer up to these days? When he's not at home with his chickens in the Hamptons, he has turned his hand to fine art – his first exhibition opened in Hanover last month. Anyone who knows and loves him, however, can't help hoping that he'll make a fashion comeback some time soon.
Hedi Slimane: The renaissance man
Also ripe for a second coming is the menswear designer Hedi Slimane. Slimane was responsible for critically acclaimed menswear collections first at Yves Saint Laurent, where he was employed between 1997 and 1999, then at Dior. During that period he transformed the look of modern menswear, creating the ultra-skinny, androgynous look that was so desirable women started buying it too.
At Dior, Slimane was responsible not just for clothing but also for fragrance and cosmetics lines. He parted company with the luxury label early in 2007 after both sides spent six months trying to reach a new contractual agreement.
As well as being one of the most accomplished fashion designers to emerge in recent years, Slimane, like his admirer Karl Lagerfeld, is something of a renaissance man. He has designed album covers and contributed writing and photography to numerous style and fashion magazines. Everyone who is anyone awaits his return to fashion with anticipation – and a debut in womenswear in particular.