Super-long, picture heavy (and slightly delayed), I present to you London Fashion Week SS16. I wasn’t very lucky this season as I got ill the day Fashion Week started in London so was only able to attend the last day of shows. Nonetheless I had so much fun and enjoyed watching the shows and presentations of some designers I wasn’t very familiar with. My day started at Mary Benson who got inspired by love and wanted to show how empowering being a woman is.
Benson’s women are fierce, feminists and dress to make a statement. And let me tell you they look amazing while doing so. Layers upon layers of tulle in dress and even socks matched with embroidered structured denim, crazy sunglasses and headpieces. Little notes and papers were flying around or stuck on the walls featuring handwritten melancholic notes of heartbreak. This season with a collection named “Letters from the Darkest corners of my Heart” Benson collaborated with tapestry expert Laura Lees, milliner Stephen Jones, jewellers Tatty Devine and shoemaker Melissa to create her whimsical and sad love story of a fashion collection.
Next up was Alexander Lewis living in a technicolour dream. Lewis collaborated with glassmaking artist Flavie Audi who helped the designer by suggesting themes based on her reactions to Lewis’ resort collection. Glass, light, refraction and natural elements are some of the themes for his first LFW collection. Embroidered clouds and mirrored cubes are juxtaposed with the bright blue skirts, silver embroideries and pops of colour. Lewis is part of the Swarovski Collective for 2016, working in creative partnership with Swarovski, seen in a variety of his designs.
Emilio de la Morena showed a beautiful, elegant evening collection. Demure necklines work great with fluid skirts and structured pieces. The colour palette ranges from mint, tangerine, fuchsia, and emerald as well as metallic embroideries and tartan jacquards.
Christopher Raeburn is always one of my personal favourites. He combines fashion with practical in the chicest way possible, without looking over the top. His SS16 collection is called ‘Sarawak’ and is all about adventure, travelling and the jungle territory of Borneo. 
His women are turned into explorers in an unknown environment. Utilitarian chic reinvented yet again in beautiful fluid, semi-transparent fabrics in khaki, olive green, black, white, sky blue paired with the best everyday sandals. Raeburn teamed up with Clarks for his first footwear collection to accompany the masculine vs feminine of his apparel. Raeburn always uses innovative fabrics and creates environmentally-sustainable collections and this season was no exception; he uses black and white airbrake parachutes (that were used to produce drag in aircraft landing), to create his signature outerwear.
Ashish is the king of sparkle always and this being my first show of his to attend it’s safe to say I was mesmerised. See-through maxi dresses, distressed denim, girls on skateboards skating down the catwalk all covered in multi-coloured sequins. It was a sparkling dream. Musicians Larry B and Jay Boogie also made an appearance that was cheered from the crowd.
Ashish also showed how important gender equality is, as Larry B wore a slip dress with female parts drawn on. This is even more refreshing to see, as Ashish not only cares about the fashion but the politics of what goes around in the world. Well done.
Last one up was Tata Naka known for their printed dresses, who celebrated the magical South American culture. Novelist Gabriel García Márquez and Mexican painter Diego Rivera were inspirations for this collection while exploring the idea of magic realism. Motifs from Rivera’s paintings were used, such as his famous Calla Lilies.
Having been recovering from a cold I went for something as comfortable as possible. So dress and a New Balances were what I went for. I love this dress by Greek designer Evi Grintela, not only it’s a beautiful soft but structured piece but it can be worn during winter and summertime because of its long sleeves and can easily be paired with tights or worn without. And the necker-chief is a great way to accessorise without wearing any heavy jewellery.
I was wearing: Evi Grintela dress (similar) | All Saints men’s jacket (here) | New Balance shoes (here on sale!) | Balenciaga bag (similar) | Bandana (eBay)
