Okay, enough with the trench coats. Give me some Celia Birtwell.

Lee’s ambition seems to be: “Even without the Check, even without the iconic trench, I can still make Burberry feel like Burberry.” And to be fair, the concept works, the visuals work—at least halfway—but the brand recognition takes a serious hit.

The deliberate crumpling, softness, worn-in textures and irregularity do produce some genuinely good pieces when combined with the right cuts and fabrics, like looks 15, 17, 18, 19 and 20. But there are also quite a few looks that give off this strangely defeated, almost lethargic feeling. Lee might call it lived-in, but to me it feels much closer to worn-out. And this kind of imperfect doesn’t necessarily read as relaxed or youthful.

One of the things I find most compelling about Burberry is precisely this idea: the weather is terrible, but you still walk through it with your head held high. Yet in this collection, some looks feel more like the person wearing Burberry has become completely swallowed by the clothes and the prints. Everything is loosened up, and then we’re told that this is what “relaxed” looks like. But to me, real relaxation is more like: “I don’t need to try hard, but I’m still completely in control.”

And Celia Birtwell herself is actually a perfectly reasonable source of inspiration. The problem is that the collection sometimes turns her work into a pile-up of visual information without enough strength in the silhouettes. A little empty here? Add some florals. Still feels empty there? Add something else. If Lee had really absorbed what makes Birtwell’s work so effective, the lesson should have been: understand why she was able to make the pattern become part of the garment itself. Not: I need something really eye-catching here, so let’s throw in a Birtwell floral.

And why does it always feel like “lethargic = youthful = relaxed = human”? Young people really don’t dress like this, come on. 🙄 Nobody actually wants to leave the house looking like they slept in their clothes.

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Worn-out