At London Fashion Week, the biggest sound came from the smallest designers. Indie brands made the most of the seasonal void left by a relative of household names, pumping up the volume with armfuls of intent.
Yes, JW Anderson and Burberry were both in attendance this year, offering solid Spring/Summer 2025 collections abundant with their own forms of intrigue. Great pants at Burberry! Beautiful accessorizing at JWA!
But you already have expectations for these titans. It’s the ground-up surprises that engendered the week’s best looks and most momentous moments.
Part of this is an extension of the shifting norms at fashion week — runway shows are so expensive and so exclusive that designers just as often utilize them to go viral as they do to actually showcase clothing.
But there was a nice balance at London Fashion Week Spring/Summer 2025, held from September 12-17.
Aaron Esh’s Jaguar-supported presentation, for instance, offered nothing but uncomplicatedly excellent garments. This is fashion undistilled, all clean lines and pared-back palette. Beautiful.
Similarly classy? S.S.Daley’s debut womenswear line, demonstrative of the LVMH Prize winner’s skill in translating his quintessentially British design cues across genders.
And a handful of young Fashion East designers, including the swiftly evolving LOUTRE, offered concise collections of creatively commercial clothing. The vision was there but it was restrained in the most complimentary sense.
And then there were the spectacles.
Di Petsa put together a theatrical showcase with costumes as glorious as anything off-Broadway while buzzy Chopova Lowena leaned into hype with deliciously flashy…
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