Truth is stranger than fashion. The Antik Denim show on March 21 was stranger still. Featuring a series of runway  stunts including a lead-off guitar solo, the Fall ’06 collection from Alexandre Caugant and Philippe Naouri made a showcase of lace outer garments and token denim hitching a ride with giant fabric holes.

Apparently, only the attached price tags will be safe from the buckshots in Antik’s hip tore-up-from-the-floor-up look.

Which goes to show that if water flows downhill, truckstop-chic flows up toward the rich and famous as Hillary Duff, Tia Carrere, Bai Ling, and Brooke Burke were on hand at the Smash Box Studios to watch the latest offerings from Caugant and Naouri.

But fashion shows will be fashion shows and if runway guitar riffs and trashy outer wear weren’t shocking enough, the mavens at Antik made sure to slow our camera shutter speed with gorgeous models flashing bare nipples through the gaping holes in their outfits.

Also making an appearance were chain and stud accessories that completed the half-naked Road Warrior theme.

Anyway, your humble correspondent admits to being tone-deaf about the siren song of reckless hip on celebs. Just the facts, if you please, but the fact of Antik’s star-appeal hovers way over the heads of earthbound civilians like me.

Kurt Vonnegut once remarked that “history is merely a list of surprises that only prepares us to be surprised yet again.” Antik has made history.