This season, London Fashion Week did little to dispel its reputation as the most innovative city on the calendar, bringing together both emerging talent and established stars for a packed week of catwalks. Tolu Coker kicked things off with her bold claim to the fashion week throne, followed by the always original and never boring Central Saint Martins MA grad show. Following that, ghostly figures plagued the runway at LUEDER’s latest collection, Daniel Del Valle’s Thevxlley brought its wearable art to the schedule for the very first time, both Masha Popova and Karoline Vitto made powerful returns to LFW, while Burberry closed out the week with an after-dark special. For everything else you might’ve missed, scroll down for our AW26 best bits.

AARON ESH

Having launched his own brand in 2022, it was announced last October that East London designer Aaron Esh would be joining AllSaints as chief creative officer. He was already a busy man, but with new titles come new responsibilities, meaning he has even less time now than he had previously. Regardless, Esh typically sits out the February fashion season, usually opting to show in September instead. For AW26, the designer delivered his collection via lookbook, showcasing a focused and refined capsule collection. Photographed on the streets of East London, the clothes are pictured in their natural habitat – they’re supposed to be worn and easily added to a daily wardrobe. It’s a collection built on a foundation of staples: jeans, trench coats, leather jackets, Harrington jackets and cable knits, all with a gritty Aaron Esh twist.

SIMONE ROCHA

Simone Rocha’s triumphant return to London Fashion Week drew upon a rich vein of Irish culture, including Tír na nÓg - a mythical land of eternal youth; the Arts and Crafts Movement of the early 20th century, and Perry Ogden’s Pony Kids, a 1999 photography series which captured young people in Dublin alongside their horses. In a nod to this latter influence, there were equestrian touches throughout the collection, such as dressage ribbons and bows, alongside the hyper-feminine floral patterns and silk, satin and lace materials which have become Rocha's trademark. What made this collection a departure from her previous work, however, was the introduction of a starker and more androgynous sportswear element (the result of a collaboration with adidas Classics): alongside sumptuous “peat-green” evening gowns, there were black bomber jackets, leotards, track tops and knee-high socks. It all made for a thrilling contrast, like a hallucinatory period drama crashing into the cutting-edge of contemporary street style.

CHOPOVA LOWENA

Famously, Chopova Lowena only shows once a year, meaning that February’s offering usually arrives by way of a lookbook, or presentation, as it was this season. The design duo took over north London’s Crafts Council to show their latest collection, which was called Too Ripe and Ready by Half. Where usually Chopova collections can feel punky and fuelled by teenage angst, this display was softer and cuter than ever. Mannequins were positioned so that their hands were held up in front of their chest like paws, while wearing knitted hoods with ears. One of them was made to look like a black cat, the other a little dog begging for its supper. It was fluffier than usual too, with faux fur boots, collars and pompoms decorating the shoes. There’s always an element of whimsy to Chopova, but AW26 took it to adorable new heights.

CHET LO

Chet Lo’s AW26 show was inspired by Hong Kong’s night markets, which the designer had replicated inside London’s Mandarin Oriental hotel. “This is where Queen Elizabeth learnt to dance,” Lo told Dazed backstage, “so I thought it was funny to have the juxtaposition of an Asian night market in this ballroom.” The stalls featured at the night market showcased the work of ten emerging Asian artists, meanwhile the profits made from the market have been donated to the Asian People’s Disability Alliance. As for the clothes, it was a compact collection with only 13 looks, though each one had been carefully refined. For an evening market, naturally, Lo produced a series of eveningwear gowns, inspired by Peking opera and the cinematic world of Wong Kar Wai.

LUCILA SAFDIE

Much like Simone Rocha, Lucila Safdie’s latest show offers a subversive twist on the aesthetics of traditional – and in this case, English – femininity. It’s framed around the societal debut of Bunny Bell, a fictional character who is “bored with life, but performs her part beautifully”, as per the show notes, and casts a cynical view at the men attempting to court her (“boys are only good for nice hair.”) But this isn’t your great-grandmother’s debutante ball: while there are wool coats, polo dresses and elegant evening gowns which wouldn’t look too out of place on an episode of Downton Abbey, the collection offers a space where “prim conformity curdles into rebellion”: think Y2K-inflected twists like trainers, ultra-short miniskirts, slogan tees and midriff-exposing blouses. It’s a very fun collection, which makes it clear why the Argentinian designer has won a host of famous fans, including Addison Rae and Rachel Sennott.

OSCAR OUYANG

Oscar Ouyang threw a masquerade ball for his second-ever London Fashion Week show. Usually, 180 Strand’s NEWGEN show space looks pretty much the same for every designer, but not for Ouyang – who managed to transform it into an Aladdin’s cave of treasures. Inside, hay bales and spinning wheels were meant to make us feel like we were inside a barn, where a group of affluent young men had planned an epic party. Relics from the family manor house had been brought into the barn – a rocking horse, a chaise longue, wine glasses – while models weaved in and out of them to the sound of Pulp’s “Common People”. Capes, cummerbunds and military-style regency period waistcoats all appeared on the runway in brooding tones of black, white and red. Meanwhile, flashes of gold appeared in the clothes, on the masks and even in the models’ hair, as if Rumpelstiltskin himself had spun the straw into gold.  

PAULINE DUJANCOURT

While werewolves were having a moment this season, French designer Pauline Dujancourt turned her sharp eye towards a different folkloric figure: the witch. Dujancourt is not interested in the witch as a horror trope or “an ugly, ridiculous figure, one we laugh at and dress up as”, however, but in the tragic, all too real history of the women who were persecuted – the show notes reference author and journalist Mona Chollet, who wrote that there are today almost no monuments dedicated to those killed during the witch hunts. Imagining these women “at home in their beds in the dark, making lace with wooden bobbins” – as the show notes read – Walking on Eggshells is an attempt to redress that erasure, and to offer “a proclamation against the historical preconceptions of what a woman should be.” Deploying traditional techniques like crochet, handknitting and tulle macramé, and a colour palette consistently mostly of blacks, greys and sombre greens, the pieces have an out-of-time, surreal or even gently sinister quality– the chiffon silk capes, woven hoods and elaborately pleated dresses could be drawn from a dark fairytale.

JAWARA ALLEYNE

As clubs, bars and clubs continued to shutter across London at an existential rate, Jawara’s Alleyne AFW show paid homage to the power of social spaces as sites of connection, belonging and transformation: Nightlife, according to the Caymanian-Jamaican designer, is “less an inspiration for the club and more of a reflection of what it’s capable of doing.” 

Drawing inspiration from pop culture figures like Rihanna and A$AP Rocky alongside Brazilian artist Paulo Nimer Pjota, the collection features plenty of thick outerwear pieces, trench coats and jackets made with boiled wools, felt and gabardines. But if the materials speak to the heaviness of a British winter (and some of the garments would keep you warm in the most baltic of smoking areas), the bright colour palettes suggest sunnier times to come: there’s cyan and royal blue dresses; orange scarfs, gold leather trousers, and baggy pants with floral patterns, with repeated tones of green, yellow and red evoking the Rastafari flag. It is a playful, heady collection which offers a vision of London nightlife as its most creative – fashion that makes you want to cancel that UberEats order, abandon your plans for a “cosy night in” and head straight to the club.

SELASI

Taking place in a sports hall and with models walking in line with a ‘beep test’, Ronan McKenzie’s official LFW debut might have brought back painful memories for those in the crowd who were less athletically inclined in their teenage years. But the show put McKenzie’s own school days as “the Queen of PE” (she still holds a borough record for athletics) to excellent use. Rather than simply being an exercise in nostalgia, the show’s ‘beep test’ theme is intended to explore the parallels between creativity and sports, and to convey the struggle of being a creative in London, where – as the show notes put it – external conditions don’t always align “with the amount of effort or intention being put in.”

Highlights included dresses, skirts and pantsuits upcycled from old PE kits donated by her alma mater, Walthamstow School for Girls, and old tracksuits from sportswear brand PANGAIA. Elsewhere, there was an emphasis on leather, which was often draped over the models in unexpected, sculptural ways. Created over the span of just 23 days, the show had a raw, improvisational energy, which spoke to McKenzi’s status as one of London’s most exciting young designers.