Precisely because there simply isn’t the same formal structure or corporate imperative that has turned the regular show system into a high-pressure money and Instagram machine, designers are more relaxed about the whole thing. They play a little. They try stuff out and shrug off the statement. Sometimes it works really well. Sometimes … whoops! That’s O.K. Blink and you can miss it.

“There’s less anxiety,” Mr. Gordon said as he talked me around his Carolina Herrera collection, which was his first as sole designer of the label. (Mrs. Herrera became global ambassador last February.) When I was there, so was Bergdorf Goodman, placing its order, so I got to spy on its rail. In case you were wondering: lots of tequila sunrise ball gowns and summer frocks, some with little wooden animals instead of bugle beads.

“I can risk a little bad taste every once in a while,” Mr. Gordon said, showing off a rainbow-striped mink cape with a matching rainbow-striped chiffon evening look, reminiscent of the cape Lena Waithe wore to the Met Gala (and not in bad taste). “Chic doesn’t have to mean uptight. These are happy clothes.” He looked chuffed amid the toucan tones.

Narciso Rodriguez said much the same after his mini-show (two rows of benches on either side of a narrow room in his office building) of sleek tops, trousers and skirts razor tailored into asymmetry. “I’m relaxing into things I’ve done in the past, but making them better and more relevant,” he said as the models milled about like greyhound puppies with nowhere particular to go.

You can’t really grumble about that. Nor about hanging out with Diane von Furstenberg as she lounges on a velvet pouf and pushes back her cloud of hair and talks about how you can roll a dragonfly print stretch net dress up and “stick it in your handbag — crunch! Like that.” And then raises an eyebrow at her creative director, Nathan Jenden, because in his enthusiasm to rush off and find a jade green fox fur jacket (“very old YSL”) he dropped a chunky knit on the ground.