Another season has come and gone, and before we dive into what the Europeans have to offer in the coming weeks, it’s time to look back at what we learned about Fall 2013 during New York Fashion Week. First and foremost, things aren’t going be be quite as busy and boisterous going forward as they have been over the past few seasons.

Marc Jacobs isn’t as widely revered for his handbags as he used to be (although it’s a different story with his work for Louis Vuitton), but the accessories that liberally dot his runway show every season are still just as influential within the industry as everything else the models are wearing. Marc Jacobs is the king of New York, and his reign doesn’t appear to be ending anytime soon, even if his handbags aren’t at the top of as many shopping lists as they were in the heyday of the Stam bag.

Everyday I feel so thankful for being able to call what I do my job, and that goes double during Fashion Week. One of my favorite aspects is that Vlad and I are able to work together during fashion week, with me watching the shows so I can report and him photographing so we can tell the story the way we see it.

There was so much build up and anticipation ahead of the Oscar de la Renta Fall 2013 collection. Ever since the brand announced that Oscar would take ex-Dior designer John Galliano into his studio, the fashion world has been buzzing about this collection. Would Galliano have a major hand in the design process, would the collection be that of a dual collaboration, would Galliano take the stage with Oscar at the end of the show?

There’s an inherent luxury to a day clutch. That a woman is free to carry her bag in her hands implies all sorts of privilege, chiefly among them that the woman in question has other people at her disposal to worry about all the things with which the contents of an oversized tote might otherwise contend. It doesn’t guarantee that someone has a driver, personal assistant or nanny, of course, but I can understand why a certain breed of woman likes the implication that the look, when well-executed, provides.

There’s perhaps nothing lovelier in the fashion business than watching a young designer blossom into one of the industry’s great talents. If 3.1 Phillip Lim Fall 2013 is any indication, that’s exactly what we’ve done with Phillip Lim; I remember when he first started making bags (there were bows involved), and to see him find his footing in luxurious modernism brings me great joy.

The subject of celebrities at New York Fashion Week is a little bit odd. Most of them are paid to be there by a designer whose show they’re attending or a brand or product that they represent, which means that many of them are wearing and carrying clothes from that designer in what can be a fairly transparent marketing scheme. The whole point of a fashion show is marketing the new collection, though, so I can’t gripe too much.

If you’re sick of oxblood (as people insist on calling it – looks like burgundy to us), then go ahead and take a seat for Fall 2013, or at least for Marc by Marc Jacobs Fall 2013. The contemporary powerhouse showed lots of rich fall colors on the runway – tan, navy, charcoal – but the most arresting accents were those in rich shades of wine.

At an Alexander Wang show, there’s always the accessory. In the past, it’s been things as varied as leather handkerchiefs and clutches shaped like old, deflated footballs, and this year, at the Alexander Wang Fall 2013 show, it was fur boxing gloves. Can you carry a handbag and wear fur boxing gloves simultaneously? That’s for magazine stylists to decide over the next few months, I suppose.