The British Fashion Council (BFC) is delighted to announce the launch of London Fashion Week Presented by Clearpay (LFW). Running from Friday 17th to Tuesday 21st September 2021, as a digital physical hybrid, the event brings together an incredible line-up of 130 brands into one schedule, with 79 physical activations and 81 digital activations.
London Fashion Week is one of the big four international Fashion Weeks, known for its exceptional creativity, innovation and responsible business. The five-day event celebrates excellence in design while empowering positive business growth for participating designers. More than just a business platform for designer’ brands to showcase their new collections, LFW is a cultural platform for change, allowing the British fashion industry to talk about the issues that matter. The international event returns to mark the long-awaited cultural reopening of London and brings back the global fashion industry to the UK. LFW will focus its attention on the importance and joy of wearing clothes and the actions people and the industry can take to act responsibly to become changemakers and create a better world.
LFW DESIGNERS
Highlights this season will include 130 designers/organisations activating on the LFW schedule across a total of 160 activations. This season will see 81 digital activations and 79 physical activations, including 28 catwalks, 10 presentations, 7 appointment listings and 34 evening event listings. In addition to the schedule, another 90 designers will activate through their LFW profiles, with a total of over 240 profiles live on the platform. The digital platform, which launched in June 2020, continues to be the Official LFW Hub, hosting evergreen multimedia designer content accessible to both industry professionals and global fashion consumers alike.
Established designers on schedule this season include David Koma, EDWARD CRUTCHLEY, Emilia Wickstead, ERDEM, JW Anderson, Margaret Howell, MARQUES ‘ ALMEIDA, Molly Goddard, OSMAN, palmer//harding, Preen by Thornton Bregazzi, Rejina Pyo, ROKSANDA, Roland Mouret, Simone Rocha, Stephen Jones Millinery, Temperley London and Vivienne Westwood.
The NEWGEN in partnership with TikTok designers on schedule include EFTYCHIA, FEBEN, HELEN KIRKUM, Labrum London, Matty Bovan, Nensi Dojaka, Richard Quinn, S.S.DALEY, SAUL NASH, Stefan Cooke, SUPRIYA LELE and yuhan wang. BFC Fashion Trust designers on schedule include HALPERN and NICHOLAS DALEY.
Additional names to highlight include Charles Jeffrey LOVERBOY, COS, FASHION EAST, Feng Chen Wang, JORDANLUCA, KNWLS, Phoebe English, Liam Hodges and Richard Malone.
The digital DiscoveryLAB in collaboration with TONI&GUY aims to support very emerging and promising designers, allowing them to gain exposure as part of the digital LFW Hub. There are 15 designers activating this season including: ANCIELA, Azura Lovisa, Max Zara Sterck, Mynok, N Palmer, SABIRAH by Deborah Latouche, The Backward Vendor, British Mustard, DREAMING ELI by Elisa, Ester Kubisz, J E CAI, JOAO MARASCHIN, POA LONDON, KATHARINA DUBBICK and VeniceW.
The LONDONshowROOMS will continue to support designers with a dedicated stream on the website’s Explore page and inclusion in a dedicated sales email campaign to retailers. Participating designers include: ASAI, Carlota Barrera, Cristiana Alagna, DANSHAN, Edward
Crutchley, EFTYCHIA, FEBEN, Fiona O’Neill, Helen Kirkum, JORDANLUCA, Kaushik Velendra,Labrum London, Olubiyi Thomas, ROKER, S.S.DALEY, SABIRAH by Deborah Latouche, SWEETLIMEJUICE and yuhan wang.
ADDITIONAL HIGHLIGHTS
BFC & The Clearpay Collective: The Clearpay Collective is a collaborative initiative between Clearpay and the BFC, bringing together innovative talent shaping the future of fashion, including Halpern and KNWLS. The Clearpay Collective will produce a range of exclusive fashion designs, unique shopping experiences, shoppable showcases and designer-led content, to celebrate London Fashion Week this September 2021. KNWLS will be offering consumers a ‘virtual front row seat’ to the showcase of the new collection at LFW this September, which will include an exclusive ‘See Now, Buy Now’ shoppable moment in partnership with The Clearpay Collective. Halpern and Clearpay are working together to provide exclusive ‘behind the scenes’ access to the designer’s collection through a series of short films created by Michael Halpern, which will give much wider access to the brand’s collection. In partnership with the BFC, Clearpay is committed to supporting and creating a brighter future for the UK retail industry and helping to jumpstart the British economy. Clearpay supports local fashion brands and retailers and are providing support and investing in their future success by putting a global spotlight on British fashion.
BFC NEWGEN TikTok Show Space: For LFW, NEWGEN’s Principal Partner TikTok is hosting a Show Space for the NEWGEN designers at The Old Selfridges Hotel and has been working with Henry Holland as Creative Producer. Designers featuring in the TikTok Show Space include EFTYCHIA, FEBEN, HELEN KIRKUM, Labrum London, Nensi Dojaka, S.S.Daley, SAUL NASH, Stefan Cooke, Supriya Lele and yuhan wang. During LFW, TikTok will also be hosting a series of exclusive workshops, panel discussions and events in the venue for TikTok Creators. This season will also see the launch of the first NEWGEN TikTok effect, a catwalk style backdrop for users to create their own fashion show with. Please check out and follow the BFC NEWGEN TikTok account here.
City-Wide Celebration: The BFC brings back its City-Wide Celebration programme, a full schedule of events and activations open to the public over LFW. Running from Friday 17th to Tuesday 21st September alongside the LFW show schedule, City-Wide Celebration aims to unite London in a festival of creativity and innovation. The dynamic schedule includes activities from over 100 brands and over 350 events in partnership with key retailers, cultural institutions, and businesses, opening London Fashion Week to new audiences and communities. The full schedule and map of City-Wide activities taking place can be found on the official LFW website here. City-Wide Celebration is running in collaboration with Limited Edition London, an initiative that is part of the Mayor of London’s Let’s Do London campaign, launched to help encourage visitors back to central London. Limited Edition London offers Londoners and visitors a varied selection of exclusive events, activities and clothing items that can only be accessed in person. The Limited Edition London programme will run from the start of London Fashion Week until the end of November. Details of the programme are available on here.
BFC & The Asahi Shimbun: New this season, the BFC has partnered with leading Japanese publication The Asahi Shimbun to amplify the LFW digital content to a local audience in Japan, and the bring the creativity and innovation of British designers part of the LFW schedule to a wider Japanese audience. The Asahi Shimbun will become the London Fashion Week Exclusive Media Partner in Japan and will host a dedicated LFW digital schedule on www.asahi.com/special/fashion, www.asahi.com/special/fashion/lfw2022ss.
London: City of Collaboration: This BFC-produced film will explore how collaboration fuels creativity and celebrate the outcomes of multi-disciplinary collaboration within this industry, and beyond. Told through the lenses of pairs of collaborators, London: City of Collaboration will build on the stories of London: City of Creativity and London: City of Connectivity, whilst also shining a light on the cultural renaissance ongoing in London. Participants include Bethany Williams in conversation with Melissa Kitty Jarram and Stavros Karelis in conversation with Declan Chan. The films will be available to watch on the LFW Website here and on YouTube here.
THE UK CREATIVE INDUSTRIES: UNLEASHING THE POWER AND POTENTIAL OF CREATIVITY REPORT
The Creative Industries Federation and Creative England recently published data showing the impact of the pandemic on the Creative Industries and crucially, what could be unlocked with the right investment. The report features newly commissioned data from Oxford Economics, which projects that, with the right investment, the creative industries sector could recover faster than the UK economy as a whole, growing by over 26% by 2025 and contributing £132.1 billion to the UK economy in GVA – over £28 billion more than in 2020, and more than the financial services, insurance and pension industries combined. Not only a major driver of economic growth, the data reveals that by 2025 the Creative Industries could create 300,000 new jobs, bouncing back from the impact of Covid-19 and surpassing pre-pandemic employment levels: generating enough new jobs to employ the working-age population of Hartlepool and Middlesbrough twice over. The full report is available to download from: www.wearecreative.uk
The BFC continues its collaboration with the United Nations Office for Partnerships (UNOP) to further engage the fashion industry in the Decade of Action to deliver the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). LFW aligns with SDGs 5 (Gender Equality), 8 (Decent Work & Economic Growth), 9 (Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure) and 12 (Responsible Consumption and Production).
The generosity and commitment of our partners, suppliers and supporters is more vital than ever. Please help us by acknowledging their support for LFW September 2021 alongside our Principal Partner: Clearpay, Official Partners COS, Evening Standard, IBM, JD.COM, INC, JOOR, The May Fair Hotel, Royal Salute and TONI&GUY and Official Suppliers DHL, Fora and Getty Images.