So the London Fashion Week womenswear shows closed in wondrous style on Tuesday evening with Burberry showing at the Chelsea College of Art, just round the corner from their headquarters. This is only the second time Burberry have shown in London in recent years (they returned for the Spring/Summer shows back in October to wild excitement from the fashion pack) and by all accounts their shows haven't disappointed. This week the soundtrack inside the venue was of pouring rain, which I just love the thought of - there's nothing better than being all cosy indoors and hearing rain pouring down outside.
And speaking of cosy... just LOOK at this collection!
I cannot describe how much I want that military jacket... the shearling detail round the bottom is just magic. I am a huge outerwear person, I have a real thing for coats and I particularly love the really high collars on these aviator jackets. I just love the idea of doing them right up on a really cold day here in London, you'd never want to go indoors!
I must confess that I do have a massive affinity for Burberry, I did some work experience with them about a year ago and I have followed their collections closely ever since. I got to work with the fabrics team on the design floor of their huge (and very beautiful) offices and it was just the most fascinating thing to sit and watch everyone going about their work. It was amazing to see just how much work goes into a collection, and even more amazing to see the finished articles in magazines and in shop windows over a year later. All those pastel colours that are currently in the Spring Summer '10 collection? I saw them pinned to a mood board in December 2008. It's just insane to think that what we are going to wear next spring has already been decided for us, for the brands this is not just last season, it's even older.
However, let's not try to get too ahead of ourselves, it's bad enough to be thinking about Autumn/Winter '10 when we're only just coming out of Autumn/Winter '09 (is anyone else SO ready for summer now? Even just a bit of pale spring sunshine would be welcome). But seeing as we're on the subject, lets go back to Burberry A/W '10: there were some welcome tailored pieces amongst the bulkiness of the sheepskin, including THIS:
A lot of the fashion publications have concentrated on the colours of the delicate lace dresses that were underneath the coats, which to be honest I didn't really care for, a couple were pretty but in all honesty I thought some of them looked cheap. However, THIS is wondrous. It was such a massive pop of colour in amongst all of the dark khakis and military greys and blues. Can you imagine walking down the road on a miserable winter day and seeing that? I know it'd make my day!
To see the whole Burberry collection go here. I recommend looking out for the military jackets with the zip-off bottoms and also the shearling ankle boots that I am going to beg, borrow or steal to get hold of!
Another success for a certain Mr Christopher Bailey, the nicest man in fashion.
