ECLECTIC, hyper-edited and rooted in reality, for her SS21 collection Victoria Beckham proposed her “true wardrobe”.
After cancelling a planned series of salon shows after the government announced their new rule of six guidelines, the designer presented her latest London Fashion Week collection via a number of private, three-person appointments and released a digital presentation on the British Fashion Council website.
Shot in the Victoria Miro Gallery, the film, which featured just twenty looks compared to the forty-six that strode down Beckham’s AW20 runway in February, showed an unmistakable honing of the London-based brand’s DNA.
“Limitations can be liberating. Working remotely, for this collection, we reacted spontaneously. We were instinctive. We asked ourselves what has changed? Who do we want to be? What will we desire?” said Beckham in the introduction to her video. “This collection is about freedom – to explore, to dress up, to be yourself. It is rooted in our true DNA, our language; strong tailoring, sharp colour, modernity.”
As you would expect from a Beckham collection, sharply-tailored ‘70s-inspired suiting appeared in a crisp white, black and eggshell, alongside a myriad of floaty parachute dresses – some with ruched necklines, others with lace-detailing and rear cut-outs – while the long hemline (another Beckham signature) returned after a brief flirt with short hemlines last season.
Low-rise, stonewashed denim, marking the first-ever appearance of jeans in the brand’s mainline, was paired with floaty silk shirts, while elongated slit trousers that swept the floor were tinged in shades of brown and apple-green.
Flats were swapped for banana and kitten heels this season, each pair trimmed with an oversized silver-tone chain – the same hardware twisted into various chunky pendant necklaces.
When Beckham unveiled her first sequence of form-fitting midi dresses twelve years ago, she faced heavy scepticism. Today, the designer’s vision for her brand is more clear-cut than ever amalgamating in an SS21 collection that perfectly encapsulates the “attitude” and “nonchalance” of the Victoria Beckham woman.
by Joshua Hendren