A few weeks before his London Fashion Week showing, I caught up with designer Geoffrey Finch at a Melbourne cafe, where, over a glass of wine he confessed that this season he feared he'd "set the bar so high, I might just hang myself." This was a high evaluation coming from someone with a strong sense of self-deprecation, so I entered the show with great expectations, which were, for the most part, met.

Antipodium are a label born of commercial intuition, and while they may be offbeat in their buy-ability, these are clothes designed always with customer more in mind than some kind of grand creative statement. Instead, the narratives these garments weave are more subtle, all whisper and inference, and this season it was a tale of suburban distress, inspired by Woody Allen's 1978 outing Interiors. 

For some reason, the quiet, composed desperation of the suburbs has been a fertile field for London designers this season, with Finch joining Richard Nicoll and Jonathan Saunders in drawing on the eddies of darkness that swirl beneath domesticity's placid surface. Unlike Saunders and Nicoll however, whose runway-to-reality paths tend to involve some toning down, with Antipodium what you see is what you'll find hanging on the racks of Liberty and David Jones in a few months time. 

The result was a range where the connotations, like the source material itself, were subtle at first, something you may just miss if you don't know what to look for. The idea of familial confusion manifested itself in daddy's business suits and coats, as donned by mother and daughter, resulting in a slightly oversized, androgynous shape, while a short-short long-jacket combination for boys hinted at a big-sister sense of flesh flashing provocation. 

There was plenty of the label's signature selling points - prints that on closer inspection are not quite what they seem, silk shirting with preppy pointy collars,  and relaxed little dresses - but the whole thing had been kicked up a notch thanks to more luxurious fabrications like patent leather, crystal studded organza and slinky chiffons. Most outstanding of all was a custom-made lace, developed by Daniel Mcilwraith, that depicted cutlery clattering floor-ward in a scene of kitchen clamour. Cut into close-sitting dresses, camisoles and midi-skirts it had all the grace of lace, but with a double-take touch of the weird. It was also nice to see the little signature cutaway 'A' pop up on the storm flaps of trench coats, and in various other places.

The show had what could well be the most diverse casting of the week, with (and this speaks of a business strategy of similar agelessness), models walking well into their sixties, and several heights and sizes represented in the line-up. 

The sound track to the show's final exit  - a classical piano rendering of 'This Charming Man' - proved the perfect summary. These clothes are elegant, charming, but, when you think about it, just a bit strange.