Valentino's new design team slashed hemlines, toned down the palette and substituted the old lady brocades for racy tulle and lace for a winter 2010 haute couture collection Wednesday that looked aimed to seduce a younger, hipper clientele.

Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pier Paolo Piccioli _ who last year replaced Valentino's successor just two seasons after the maestro retired _ had been stuck in the label's archives. For their first two collections at the helm of the house, they delivered up couture and pret-a-porter collections that were "more Valentino than Valentino," full of ladylike duchess silk coats in jewel tones and proper A-line dresses embellished with oversized bows and roses.

This time around, however, they delivered a more personal collection which, though it included classic Valentino elements, pushed the house's look forward.

Although haute couture is almost by definition the realm of older people _ how many 20-year-olds can afford a euro20,000-plus ($28,000-plus) dress? _ Chiuri and Piccioli looked to rejuvenate the brand's rather staid image by swapping stateliness for sexiness.

Bustiers in nude tulle were the foundation of the two-toned collection, which was overlaid by panels of black peek-a-boo lace that was anything but proper. The thigh-skimming skirts were anything but ladylike.

Highlights included a floor-length gown made from tufts of black tulle, worn over a beige bustier. It pulsed with an almost aquatic delicacy, like a rare, light-fearing sea anemone. A strapless bodice in black bands sprouted a mammoth bow in the back, like the folded wings of a newly hatched moth.

Many of the models wore black lace masks that lent the show the slightly decadent and depraved air of a Venetian carnival.

Piccioli and Chiuri said their previous collections were based on memory _ the storied label's history _ while this one was based on an image they themselves had conjured.

"This time, it's maybe more about soul than memory," Piccioli told The Associated Press in a backstage interview.

Other pieces looked less like the designer's personal vision than something they might have borrowed _ perhaps without asking? _ from their contemporaries.

A banded-bodiced gown in fluttering chiffon looked like it stepped off the Givenchy runway. A blinding silver minidress was a dead ringer for Christophe Decarnin's tiny, rhinestone-covered party dresses that have made Balmain a must-have label for jet-set girls looking to shine.

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