Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue. London Fashion Week is nothing if not a marriage of opposites, where a packed schedule juxtaposes fresh talent with old-timers, commercial juggernauts with penny-pinching start-ups, and originality with rehash.
The latter characterises the Topshop show: the borrowed bit of that marital equation . But not necessarily in a bad way. Topshop is about commerce, first and foremost, about shifting lots of product to lots of people, even in the high-end line the brand labels “Unique”. It’s nothing of the sort, this time citing an heirloom feel that smacks of the new approach of Alessandro Michele-lead Gucci (themselves slated to show on Wednesday, when the fashion action shifts to Milan).
The clothes themselves were familiar, with their slithery lingerie-look silk dresses and pyjama jackets, patterned with porcelain prints in an unexpected but not especially remarkable collaboration with Westwood. Marabou-frothed mules were another obvious boudoir touch - more Fredericks of Hollywood than Madame de Pompadour, you could nevertheless imagine girls wearing them if they wanted to get noticed, just like the oversized clutch-bags, the shoes twisted with contrast satin bows, or the dangling mismatching earrings. Youth was the overriding impression, clothes designed for teenage girls to dress up, mess up and then bin. It’s disposable fashion, and like the clothes the memories of this show were easily disregarded.
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Topshop originally crept onto the London Fashion Week schedule back in the early noughties with a promise to support innovation. They did it well: their deep coffers shored up London Fashion Week, allowing fledgling designers to spread their wings without the fear of bank managers clipping them, or indeed their overdrafts proving an albatross.
A few have soared from the nest, like JW Anderson (who showed on Saturday), Christopher Kane (showing Monday) and Mary Katrantzou, who unveiled her spring/summer 2016 range on Sunday evening. “An exploration of exploration,” she dubbed it, her terminology for an eye-popping meld of print and embroidery influenced by Russian and Balkan folk costume and cosmic star-mapping. Ruffled layers were spangled with depictions of a fantastical cosmos, embroideries and laces evoked an itinerant jaunt through half a dozen cultures, quilted lamé was painstakingly outlined in pearls like French couture’s finest.
Katrantzou’s come a long was from a rail of shift dresses in eye-popping prints - not least in the depth and variety of her collection. And, doubtless, its cost. If the richness of this show - beading, laces, prints, crystals, frequently mashed together in a single bejewelled outfit balanced atop gilded cage heels - mired it, firmly, in the category of after dark attire (even tailored coats turned evening, inset as they were with those chains, or glimmering metallic ribbons under lace), there’ll be plenty more on the rails in Katrantzou’s showrooms, watered-down variations on her show spectacle. Sometimes, that can prove something of an issue. You wanted a little more breadth to Katrantzou’s catwalk proposal - you wanted her to explore reality. Despite all those beaded stars, her women do dream of dressing before night falls.
Breadth is never an issue with Vivienne Westwood, British fashion’s grand dame. Her relentless idiosyncrasy and uncompromising design ethos has inspired entire generations. Which explains why, today, she sits on her laurels, devotes herself to her environmental and political fixations, and occasionally lets the fashion take a backseat. Westwood’s clothes are still handsome, often innovative, frequently insane.
She alone is a designer who can never be accused of copying, at least not anyone but herself, the source of the printed lace and drawstring tie details that have, coincidentally, cropped up on other catwalks. Westwood invented underwear as outerwear with her former fashion partner, the late Malcolm McLaren, and her version was one of the most interesting, and least flimsy. Again, the clothes were coupled with a sociopolitical message - climate change, and political corruption - but even with Westwood herself waving a placard in her finale bow, they didn’t seem like a wholly irrelevant backdrop. For once, Westwood’s marriage of style and substance didn’t overwhelm her clothing
