Fashion News: Mulberry prepares London Fashion Week return as financial recovery gathers pace

Mulberry is set to make a high-profile return to the London Fashion Week runway this month, marking a significant moment for the British luxury fashion house as it combines a new creative direction with signs of a strengthening financial performance.

Mulberry - Shot by Federico Radaelli

The return to the runway is central to CEO Andrea Baldo’s “Back to the Mulberry Spirit” strategy, which aims to rebuild the ready-to-wear business alongside the brand’s established accessories offering.

The company will return to the London Fashion Week schedule on September 20, following a six-year absence. The show will present the first women's ready-to-wear collection designed by newly appointed Creative Director Christopher Kane, signalling a new chapter for the Somerset-based brand.

Kane's appointment is expected to bring a fresh creative perspective to Mulberry as the company seeks to reinforce its position as a leading British luxury label. His debut will be closely watched as the fashion industry assesses how his design language will translate across Mulberry's established leather-goods heritage and its wider ready-to-wear offer.

The runway return comes against a backdrop of improving financial results. Mulberry reported group revenue of £125.5 million for its latest financial year, representing a 4% increase. Pre-tax losses were reduced substantially to £8.9 million, compared with £32.2 million in the previous year.

The company also reported an improvement in gross margin to 72%, helped by a reduction in promotional discounting. The figures suggest that the business has been making progress towards improving the quality and profitability of its sales, rather than relying heavily on markdowns to drive demand.

That momentum appears to have continued into the opening quarter of the new financial year. Group revenue rose by 23% year on year, with wholesale and franchise revenue recording a particularly strong 56% increase.

The growth in wholesale and franchise business provides an encouraging indication of demand for the brand beyond its directly operated retail network and could give Mulberry greater scope to expand its international presence without relying solely on investment in company-owned stores.

At the same time, Mulberry is continuing to refine its physical retail footprint in the UK. The company has signed a lease for a new 979 sq ft boutique at Liverpool ONE, with the store scheduled to open in November 2026.

The new boutique will add to Mulberry's existing UK retail presence as the company focuses on what it describes as a more refined brick-and-mortar strategy. The Liverpool location also places the brand within one of the UK's major premium shopping destinations, extending its reach beyond London.

Further changes at board level are also planned. From September 9, Mulberry will appoint Sara Dickinson and Kenny Wilson as non-executive directors. Wilson, the former chief executive of Dr. Martens, brings extensive experience of international brand development and the publicly listed consumer sector, while Dickinson adds further industry expertise to the board.

Taken together, the changes point to a period of significant transition for Mulberry. The arrival of Kane, the return to the London Fashion Week runway, improving margins, a sharp reduction in losses and accelerating first-quarter revenue growth suggest that the company is attempting to establish a stronger platform for its next phase of development.

For the British luxury sector, Kane's September 20 debut is likely to be one of the key moments of the London Fashion Week schedule, providing an early indication of how Mulberry intends to balance its distinctive British heritage with a renewed fashion proposition.

Copenhagen Fashion Week: Caro Editions Delivers a Love Letter With SS26 Show “Under the Bridge” - Featuring a Collaboration with Mulberry

Beneath the steel beams and cobblestones of Knippelsbro (Knippel Bridge in English) - a place steeped in personal history - Caro Editions unveiled its Spring/Summer 2026 collection with a show that was equal parts fashion, memory, and poetic resistance.

Caro Editios designer and founder Caroline Bille Brahe flanked by two of her models.
Copenhagen Fashion Week Photo by James Cochrane

Titled “Under the Bridge,” the presentation held on August 4 - day one of Copenhagen Fashion Week, marked a deeply intimate return for designers Caroline and Frederik Bille Brahe, who were married in this very spot. Years later, the bridge now served as the emotional and symbolic foundation for a show that explored the intersection of romance, public space, and soft rebellion.

In a raw, urban setting beneath one of Copenhagen’s busiest thoroughfares, Caro Editions built a dreamscape of tenderness and texture. Flowing silk dresses, hand-embroidered garments, and veiled silhouettes evoked memories of bridalwear, while simultaneously subverting traditional tropes. The bride here was not bound to convention — she was a symbol of visibility, activism, and individuality, inspired in part by Yoko Ono’s Brides on Tour.

“There’s lots of black, a first for me,” said Caroline Bille Brahe. “But also glorious colours and contrasts. I was thinking about wedding guests of all kinds — different ages, sizes, styles. Rich silks in workwear shapes. Comfortable, glamorous, real.”

One of the most talked-about moments was the finale: a bride in a lace hoodie, a silk windbreaker, and custom Crocs — Caro’s idea of a down-to-earth muse, ready to dance all night. This wasn’t a traditional wedding procession. It was a playful yet profound meditation on the joy of showing up — as yourself, in full colour.

Soundtracking the show was a custom composition by Frederik Valentin. His mix of punk and pop created a sonic collage, echoing the show’s nostalgic thread — a fragmented love story slowly unfolding into something melodic, emotional, even euphoric.

This season also saw a standout collaboration with British heritage brand Mulberry. In a celebration of reuse and reimagination, Caroline reworked vintage Mulberry bags into eight one-of-a-kind designs — adorned with Caro’s signature silk bows, embroidery, and contrasting linings. “In my generation, if your mother had a Mulberry bag, you were lucky,” Caroline recalled. “Now I’ve made my own — with the lining on the outside instead of hidden. It’s all about turning memory inside out.”

Founded in 2022, Caro Editions has quickly built a reputation for blending romantic nostalgia with modern ease. Often working with deadstock fabrics from Chanel, Dries Van Noten, and Harris Tweed, the label champions craft, sustainability, and individuality — always with a playful twist.

“I resist the idea of the Caro girl,” said Caroline. “I don’t want to put anyone in a box. I want people to fall in love with a piece of our world and make it their own. That’s the essence of Caro Editions.”

With Under the Bridge, the brand didn’t just deliver a fashion show — it delivered a love letter. To Copenhagen. To memory. To presence. And above all, to the quiet power of showing up — together.

All photos by James Cochrane, at Copenhagen Fashion Week SS26 edition. 

UK department stores, brands and designers produce essential scrubs and gowns for NHS

In the face of a pandemic crisis, many fashion retailers, designers and luxury brands have stepped up to the occasion and demonstrate their leadership that is so required at these challenging times.

While management executives are prioritizing the safety of employees and customers and putting new health and safety protocols and crisis-response activities in place, many are taking the opportunity to show they care and offer services that do good to the community, which can only score positive points in the eyes of their customers when things do finally go back to normal.

John Lewis image.

For one, department store John Lewis has re-opened its textile factory, ‘Herbert Parkinson’ in Lancashire to make protective gowns for the National Health Service (NHS).  This follows its recent initiative to create a wellbeing area for staff at the newly set-up NHS Nightingale hospitals in London and Manchester and working with the British Medical Association to deliver 60,000 essentials to key NHS staff.

The Herbert Parkinson factory which normally produces bespoke blinds, curtains, cushions, pillows and duvets, will this week begin making around 8,000 washable, clinical gowns for the Northumbria NHS Foundation Trust.  In addition, John Lewis will also be donating more than 20,000 metres of cotton fabric from its haberdashery department and distribution centres to two groups making scrubs for the NHS - ‘For The Love of Scrubs’ and ‘Scrubs Glorious Scrubs’. It is expected that this donated fabric will produce some 6,000 scrubs.

Elsewhere in the UK, fashion luxury brand Mulberry has switched its handbag factory in Somerset to making 8,000 gowns for NHS workers in Bristol.  
Homewares chain Dunelm has also turned its curtain factory into making scrubs for NHS workers, while home and fashion brand Laura Ashley’s factory in Carno, Powyrs, in Wales have also been making scrubs.
A few weeks ago, luxury brand Burberry announced it was underetaking a series of measures, including using its global supply network to deliver 100,000 surgical masks to NHS workers, and dedicating its trench coat factory in Yorkshire to manufacturing non-surgical gowns and masks for patients in British hospitals.
Separately Fashion Roundtable, the secretariat for the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Textiles and Fashion, announced that it had brought together designers, manufacturers, the UK Cabinet, the Department for International Trade and several brands with the aim of supplying PPE to the NHS and additional protective products to the general public.
Make It British is also uniting UK manufacturers to produce PPE for frontline staff, while British designer Phoebe English is leading a team of independent UK designers – including Bethany Williams and Holly Fulton – to produce non-frontline protective clothing with the Home Office’s Emergency Designer Network.