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Waxed jackets, peplum skirts, gold-studded mittens, and the cutest owl motifs you've ever seen all featured in today's show-stopping Burberry Prorsum runway presentation in their immense glass-house tent on the edge of Hyde Park in London. Alexa Chung, Will.I.Am, and Kate Bosworth sat front-row at the 56-look spectacular, which was the biggest name on London's Fashion Week schedule. Keeping at the edge of the e-commerce revolution, Burberry also announced that the collection would be available for purchase exclusively online for one week.
Master creative director Christopher Bailey kept it fun and commercial in the best way possible, with tons of accessories and voluminous skirted trench-coats that toyed with the brand's history and heritage in a playfully modern way. We saw the same military touches and skinny silhouette that we're used to from Burberry, but with a more casual element than in previous seasons. Slouchy sleeves and T-shirts with those owls gave the collection a youthful edge, while brocade skirts and tweedy riding jackets will appeal to an older demographic—i.e., those with more cash to splash on Burberry's high-end wares.
As the show's finale began, an artificial rainstorm started to pour on the tent's roof overhead. The models came out clutching ornate umbrellas with embellished handles, another reminder of the two most iconic things in a Burberry collection: luxe accessories and those unforgettable raincoats and trenches. Burberry's staked out an important place in fashion as the arbiters of hip stylish Britannia and this doesn't appear to be changing anytime soon.
The brand is setting the trend in terms of how we interact with high fashion, too — fans could watch the runway show online and on large screens at Heathrow airport and in Burberry's store in Beijing, and every look was tweeted in animated form for followers to keep up with. —Ana Kinsella
#&183;Burberry [Official site]
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