If you needed reminding that fashion is a multi-billion pound industry, the Burberry show was pretty quick to jog your memory. It took place in Peak’s Field, a new location for the ready-to-wear, which is basically the Queen’s back garden for those who don’t know Hyde Park like the back of your hand (unlike Burberry’s clientele). We might have been on the wrong side of the ocean as the Oscars but if a high production value and a smattering of faces you really do recognise (speaking of the Queen, Maggie Gyllenhaal was front row) are things you look for in fashion, Christopher Bailey has consistently got you covered. To some, this press-savvy, star-studded Burberry represents everything that’s wrong with an increasingly corporate industry; personally I’m refreshed by its absolute honesty.
The thing is Burberry is not cool. That’s not an insult it’s just fact, and it’s not a fact that Burberry aren’t aware of - I mean Ronan Keating was also on the front row. What they’ve done so consistently since Bailey took the helm is embrace the expanse of the mainstream in an incredibly upmarket way. The clothes at Burberry are smart, this season saw the trench coat losing itself down the hippie trail in (you guessed it) the seventies. Fringing over boots, bags and capes was this season’s go to detail for Bailey, while appliqued suede thigh high boots, sitting pretty on Cara Delevingne’s legs on the front row, of course, were practically designed to be drooled over on Instagram. As the procession of models walked through the finale gold foil rained down from the ceiling and a choir of singers emerged along the sides of the room. It’s very far from experimental or unexpected, but as long as the front row’s packed out and the (leopard print clutch) bags are in enough hi-res shots, I get the feeling Burberry couldn’t care less about cool.
