A Look at London Fashion Week SS22

How do we feel about this semi-quasi-fashion week? Even with lockdown restrictions lifting in the UK, the weekend was still digital for the majority, with a few sparse fashion shows. Many brands decided to withdraw from the schedule altogether in favour of September, and it was slim pickings this LFW.  

Despite this, there were some significant collections. Many collaborated with big brands to bring the noise over such a quiet weekend. Irish designer Robyn Lynch’s choice was the outerwear brand Columbia. A continuation of her rolling collaboration series (last season, she worked with cycling brand Rapha), Lynch’s collection was a great reworking of her classic silhouettes and cable knits, with a nonseasonal performance-wear twist.  

Designer Priya Ahluwalia, the recent winner of the British GQ prize, had collaborated with Mulberry on accessories for her SS22 film and collection ‘Parts of Me’. She has been on an impressive trajectory over the past year or so, and this collection cemented why: meditative, considered, and altogether more refined (even without the Mulberry bags), the tailored pieces, womenswear stylings and denim signatures were sublime.  

Bethany Williams too presented arguably one of her best collections yet. Sumptuously decadent tailoring with child-like silhouettes or finishes sat with repurposed patchwork knits and painterly prints by Melissa Kitty Jarram. Brands such as Williams or Ahluwalia, who actively make positive change, have brought opulence to a fashion genre often misread as ‘crafty’.

Both PublishedBy and King and Tuckfield pulled new shapes and ideas from their lockdown experiences; the former was a bevvy of contemporary accessory silhouettes inspired by foraging, the latter an ushering of modern classics and practical basics. The University of Westminster also brought a pang of vitality to the schedule with their truly fantastic BA designs - Everette Bullen, Jesse O’Shannon and Frederic Redman, a few personal favourites.  

This London Fashion Week was supposedly a mixed-gender affair. Still, aside from Reuben Selby’s debut intersectional show and a period-drama-esque frilly Preen by Thornton Bregazzi, this fashion week was rather menswear-centric. Even hyper-feminine Erdem launched a menswear line. Hopefully, this is a signifier that September will be a much more inclusive and involved fashion week for London, with the Rewiring Fashion ideals (non-seasonal, un-gendered, smarter timings) brought forward.  

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