Daniel Lee’s Spring 2024 Burberry collection welcomes a new era for the signature check
It’s been six months since Daniel Lee first entered Burberry and the creative director’s rebrand of the British fashion house has easily exceeded expectations. The beginning of the year saw a new logo, new typeface, and a new bunch of ambassadors take the chequered stage. The refresh took a youthful turn with the same foundations of quintessential Britishness, recruiting the likes of Kano, Shygirl, Skepta, John Glacier, and Liberty Ross as the faces.
So now, it is most definitely official: Burberry has been modernised for the new generation. But the way in which Lee has kept those roots of the brand DNA is a lesson in how brands should be doing it in 2023. The debut collection at London Fashion Week Men’s presented the key point of focus being updated tradition, and now for Spring 2024, and now any concerns of a U-turn that stops short of a complete overhaul have been put to rest.
Staples of British fashion become more vibrant, with an element of excitement running through the interlocking stripes of the new Burberry check. Trench coats are accompanied by bomber jackets, blanket capes, parkas, quilted numbers, and, aviators – with a clear focus on the multi-functional aspect of outerwear. The strong British motifs run through the likes of standout leather garments, with an interjection of glorious emerald green floral prints. Preppy jerseys and cut-off arm argyle jumpers join strong biker boots and matching scarves, with a slew of bags thrown over the arms of the models. One of the best accessories is the oversized shearling trapper hat that stands tall with ear flaps almost engulfing the face, debuting in green with a brown fur companion later down the line.
Burberry still reigns supreme in the silhouettes, however, with tailored ensembles showing the tight-knit relationship to the Savile Row craftsmanship that has inspired many a previous collection. The Knight bag family also returns, this time morphed into quilted, crinkled, and puffed leather versions. What’s more, the rugby jerseys and cricket jumpers are British through and through, rarely venturing from traditional design when it comes to these pieces.
The signature check got the Lee treatment too, feeling bolder and more prominent with a palette of leafy greens, daffodil yellows, pastel pinks, and apt royal blues. It lies across the outerwear, knits, tights, bucket hats, bags, and shoes, flooding the look with a pattern that ignites the new Burberry attitude. Some of the checks even feature a psychedelic swirl, which perhaps symbolises Lee slightly bending the tight roots of the brand’s core values so the room to experiment expands outwardly.
The Spring 2024 collection continues to impress with what the new creative director has to offer. Though Lee’s reign may still be in its infancy, it is evident that the future of Burberry is well and truly in the best hands it could be. And with the slow rebranding of one of the country’s most recognisable labels, Lee is well and truly carving out a new era in his own time.
