Can Burberry get its groove back?

After a stormy decade of profit warnings and flatlining sales, change has been in the air for Burberry lately.

The arrival last year of a new and well-regarded chief executive, Joshua Schulman, has helped to calm the waters following an ill-conceived push upmarket by his predecessors. The former head of Coach has lowered prices in areas such as leather accessories while driving focus around the product Burberry is best known for — outerwear (he has also cut hundreds of jobs). Tongue-in-cheek marketing campaigns featuring British national icons like Kate Winslet and Dame Mary Berry, or TikTok’s Bus Aunty cruising London in a red double-decker, have delighted the internet and helped to revive interest in the brand.

But at a time when virtually every player in the global luxury market is grappling with consumer malaise, will the turnaround efforts prove enough?

On the eve of its London Fashion Week runway show on Monday (Sep 22) night, at least one sign suggested things were heading in the right direction: Britain’s largest luxury brand by sales officially rejoined the FTSE 100. And as a large crowd gathered in the autumn sunshine outside a show tent that had been erected on the lawns of Kensington Gardens — within the grounds of the palace, no less — chatter was louder than ever around whether Burberry might once again become a force: not just in fashion, but in shaping perceptions of British culture around the world. 

No pressure, then, on the shoulders of Burberry creative director Daniel Lee to deliver the goods — and to a star-studded crowd. Those assembled on the front row included Elton John, Joanna Lumley and Jennifer Saunders in a reunion of the Absolutely Fabulous duo, former footballer Ian Wright, supermodels such as Naomi Campbell and Rosie Huntington-Whiteley and an entire seating block of Vogue editors flanking Anna Wintour, who sat beside the British tennis player Jack Draper.

Big hopes for blue skies ahead were made abundantly clear — the gargantuan tarpaulin ceiling had been painted so, in the style of JMW Turner. Underfoot was a crumbly dust the colour of chocolate; designed to look like mud but — crucially — not splatter unattractively on to the heel of a fashion-week stiletto. 

Tents. Open skies. (Fake) mud. You guessed it, this season Lee had landed on embracing British festival spirit. Which wasn’t a bad call, per se. Events such as Glastonbury summon religious fervour for millions of people, as well as serving as a cornerstone of the nostalgic 90s Cool Britannia movement. Legendary musical performances, euphoric collective singing, celebrities mingling with ordinary sorts — and everyone dependent on wearing rainproof coats and boots even at the height of summer (this is England, after all). It-Girl Alexa Chung had even set the tone in a dreamy campaign shot released in June wearing pink sequins, a dark parka and rubber Wellingtons in the Burberry signature plaid. 

Only, this wasn’t exactly what came down the runway. It felt as though Lee had more of a 1960s festival culture in mind. So models of both sexes wore sharp and skinny Mod-ish suits cropped at the ankle in shades of ochre, purple and tobacco, and swishy, swinging mini dresses in embroidered crochet, coloured chainmail or entirely woven from tiny beads. Buttoned up biker jackets were worn by long-haired models with their hands stuffed inside the pockets. And of course, trenchcoats also featured — lots and lots of belted trenchcoats — in leather laser-cut to look like paisley lace, buttery soft suede and then shinier variations — mimicking the glistening shimmer of British raindrops — that came in denim and plaid, including a bold cropped and checkered version in green and yellow that opened the show. 

“Musicians have always been pioneers — fearless in the way they dress and sound,” Lee said in the show notes. “A legacy you’ll see in the looks, cast and styling.”

Certainly these felt like looks for performers who wanted to turn heads, rather than those queueing up for the Portaloo. Sun, cloud and flower-power motifs put a bit of a spring in the step of the collection and had hippie echoes, as did the slouchy, oversized suede bags covered in fringing. On the footwear front, boots were chunky and rubber-soled and laced up to the mid-calf, with some backless, chunky-heeled mules or sliders thrown into the mix. 

It was slick and polished, with plenty of outerwear designed to propel the great reset. But it didn’t quite feel like a collection that could guarantee Burberry sun after the rain. The forecast still feels somewhat unpredictable. What could be more British than that?

Elizabeth Paton © 2025 The Financial Times 

This article originally appeared in The Financial Times