When people say they leave the best till last, they are not kidding around. My last show of LFW was the one I was most excited about; Christopher Raeburn! And it was taking place at the new BFC Show Space location of Brewer Street Car Park (interesting to say the least).
Now let me get this off my chest first- I definitely missed Somerset House this season. I missed the open spaces, where you could stroll around at your own leisure, have a good old catch up with friends and get street styled if you were lucky enough. Let’s just say, you could do none of those at Brewer Street. The streets are chocker block with cars, so you had to weave dangerously in and out of cars just to get there. The space around the car park was minuscule, and if you stood to talk to someone you were quickly moved on by security. And there was no hope for photographers to take street style- no more typical walking-across-a-road shots as there were so many cars, and just general pandemonium. So in some ways I was kind of glad that I only had one show there so I didn’t have to deal with the chaos.
But anyway, onto the show. The Sarawak collection is inspired by the jungle territory of Borneo, and female explorers both real and imagined. Essentially, it considers women exploring an unknown environment.
This narrative is captured in ready-to-wear garment, and for the first time, footwear. Raeburn has teamed up Clarks in a unique collection for the Sarawak collection.
I was looking forward to see how he would use his parachutes this season (something the brand has become known for using), and I was not disappointed! He reimagined black and white airbrake parachutes to create amazing raw-edge dresses, and classic parachutes with mesh inserts to create separates. Colours were not forgotten about though, with olive greens and sky blues from the classic parachutes, and vibrant yellows and soft greys for lighter separates. As well as the parachutes themselves, patterns inspired by the airbrake were used to make light pieces using naturally-dyed Habitoi silk, while graphic flock hearts transfers were embellished onto cotton drill and jersey. Raeburn also teamed up with Knyttan to create a lightweight knitwear collection. It’s also clear to see that sleeveless coats won’t be going out of fashion any time soon, as they strutted down the catwalk alongside with simple kimono style jackets.
My particular favourite was a mesh black dress, that was so classically elegant, you would never know it was made of such tough fabric. The accessories were on point too, with feminine hand-tied bows supporting jacquard bumbags worn on the back.
Gx
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