Susannah Frankel: For this season, all the big names embraced the pale and interesting pout

It is only rarely that a beauty look appears on the catwalk of not just one but three fashion superpowers. If Prada, Balenciaga and Yves Saint Laurent – three entirely different brands and with entirely different new collections to match – decree that pale lipstick is the future, then the rest of us would do well to sit up and take note.

It should come as no great surprise that this particular style was approached diversely by each designer. At Prada, there was a natural, sun-kissed beauty to the models this season, to reflect what Miuccia Prada herself argues is a return to "the primitive, the essence of things". In her rumpled, cotton clothing, shot through with metal thread, the Prada woman is dishevelled, even déshabillée. If she ever even contemplated masking her beautiful features with make-up, it would no doubt be kissed off by one of many ardent admirers before too long.

Contrary to popular mythology, red lipstick, in particular, is intimidating as opposed to sexually appealing, and thus more untouchable-pin-up or even dominatrix in flavour. That is not to say that, at Yves Saint Laurent (below), the designer Stefano Pilati was imagining a come-and-get-me sex kitten. In this instance, pale lipstick only adds to the frosty and self-contained beauty of the mood of this French label this season. Here, though, there is also a sense of fragility to the pale-faced appearance, which suggests vulnerability over and above anything more rapacious in flavour.

The most extreme take on the theme is Nicolas Ghesquière's at Balenciaga, however. Here it was not only models' mouths but all of their features that appear to have been blanked out entirely. Even eyebrows were obscured. A Woman Who Fell To Earth moment, clearly. Lips, meanwhile, looked almost icy – there's nothing accessible about such a glacial look.

Neither were these the only big names to embrace a pale-and-interesting pout. At Dolce & Gabbana's second line, D&G, models' doe-eyes and lips were a lighter shade of nude, evoking the childlike innocence and optimism of the models of the 1960s. From Jean Shrimpton to Twiggy, these were the quintessentially amenable girls-next-door, compared with their haughty big sisters from the previous decade.

Over at Gucci, pale lips and big, blow-dried hair was more decadent 1970s in flavour. These lips were made for embracing. Pale faces with lips to match and dark eyes made for an almost 19th-century consumptive appeal at Giles Deacon, meanwhile, whereas for Alexander McQueen, lips that were only subtly rouged whispered of that same period, denoting a youthful, natural beauty. They looked almost as if they'd been bitten to achieve a natural flush as opposed to painted, which for now seems too artificial by far.