A model presents creations for Valentino. [Photo by Bertrand Guay/AFP]

Grand Elizabethan chic with a twist was the style that Valentino's lauded designers Pierpaolo Piccioli and Maria Grazia Chiuri produced for their - typically - magnanimous couture spectacular.

Yet, much of the front row chatter centered on whether it would be newly bottle-blond Chiuri's last collection for the storied house. There are ever-intense rumors that her name is on the shortlist to succeed Raf Simons at Christian Dior.

The LVMH brand announcement is expected imminently.

The Valentino show was specifically inspired by the bard William Shakespeare. It marked, in a couture way, the 400 years since his death.

But in the process it also reminded spectators of the "intellectual" nature of the ever-artistic house, and most of all, the close relationship between the two arts of theater and clothes-making.

White Renaissance ruffs and embellished fur petticoats were mixed with Game of Thrones-style perforated dramatic black warrior mini-dresses to define the immediate aesthetic.

Criss-cross sleeves and gathered silken skirt then added to the on-theme Bard-like imagery.

Valentino's designers do best when they stay in their tried-and-tested realm of 16th and 17th century goddesses. And this strong collection was a case in point.