Christopher Kane: Mulberry’s Heritage Is a Foundation, Not a Limitation
The Business of Fashion Podcast
Christopher Kane returns to London Fashion Week as Mulberry's creative director, reinterpreting the brand's heritage with a subversive, emot
Key takeaways
- Heritage is not a constraint but a foundation for innovation.
- Newness in fashion comes from reinterpreting tradition with precision and emotional depth.
Main topics
- Christopher Kane's return to fashion
- Reimagining Mulberry's heritage
Notable quotes
For me, heritage is a foundation, it's not a limitation.
To produce more fruit, you have to cut back.
Conclusion
Christopher Kane's Mulberry debut marks a bold fusion of tradition and rebel
Transcript preview
Speaker 1 (0:05) Hi, this is Imran Ahmed, founder and CEO of the Business of Fashion. Welcome to the BOF podcast. It's Friday, September 18th. In 2023, Christopher Kane did what no independent designer ever wants to do. He closed the label he had spent 17 years building with his sister, Tammy. This was the man who put rubberized lace on the runway, who cut up saddle leather on a domestic sewing machine, and who found his ideas in the least obvious places. This Sunday, Christopher returns to London Fashion Week as Mulberry's creative director of women's wear. It's an unlikely pairing. Mulberry means Somerset Leather, country houses, and the bags everyone remembers from the brand's buzzy Alexa Chung years. Christopher's world has always been more subversive. Catholic school uniforms, the strong women who raised him in Motherwell, and the bad cool girls who have run through his work for nearly two decades. But Mulberry needs something new. Two years ago, it was fending off a takeover bid, cutting nearly a quarter of its corporate roles and seeing sales slide. Under chief executive Andrea Baldo, Mulberry is rebuilding itself around Britishness and craft, and there are early signs it's working. Sales rose 23 % in the first quarter of this financial year. Christopher's first fashion show is the next and most visible test. of that strategy. He sees the job as an extension of his idiosyncratic design sensibilities. Because Speaker 3 (1:44) for me, heritage is a foundation, it's not a limitation. So I've really worked with the heritage and taken parts of existing bags or things that have really resonated with the brand throughout the years to create something new. Speaker 1 (1:57) A few days before his debut at Mulberry, Christopher sat down with BOF's editor-at-large, Tim Blanks, who has followed his work since the beginning. They talk about the acts in his Instagram teasers and what his years away from fashion has taught him. Here's Christopher Cain in conversation with Tim Blanks on the BOF podcast. Speaker 2 (2:21) Christopher Cain. Tim. Speaker 3 (2:24) Can we call this a comeback? Yeah, I suppose. We're here at Mulberry, so it's been my first job since closing the company. So, yeah, Speaker 2 (2:35) it's a bit of a comeback. Because I'm so happy, so happy to say welcome back. Thank you. I do love the little teasers you put on Instagram with the axe chopping at the tree. Yeah. You posted that image twice. Three times. Three times? Yeah. Okay, I only saw it twice. Speaker 2 (2:53) Tell me that. Tell me about Speaker 3 (2:55) that. What's the background of that? What's that story? So I think you've known me for a long time. I've always been very obsessed with science and nature and the whole idea of the tree and the idea of the upkeep of a tree and the maintenance of a tree. Obviously, we are working for mulberry, which is a tree. So I really looked into the preservation of trees and things like that. So to produce better fruit. You have to fell it, you have to maintain it, you have to cut it back. So the axe was obviously one of the main tools as a tree surgeon to help trees maintain a healthy life cycle. So yeah, to Speaker 2 (3:33) produce more fruit, Speaker 3 (3:33) you have to cut back. Speaker 2 (3:35) So Christopher Cain, designer slash arborist. Speaker 3 (3:38) Yes, yes. And jam maker. Well, I've not got there yet, but that's coming up with the mulberry berries. There's a lot of things we can do with the berries for Speaker 2 (3:47) sure. Speaker 3 (3:48) But Speaker 2 (3:48) the axe is a motif in the collection? That seems so significant that it made me think that maybe the axe was connected with the collection. The idea of the axe was connected with Speaker 3 (3:59) the collection. It sounded like a kind of either chopping down or pruning or whatever. Which is a good point of reference because I have been editing heavily and pruning, as you would say, to fine-tune this really clear message, but also having a blade-like precision. And I think I've learned that. over 20 years in the business of really having heavy edit and just always trying and trying to be precise but yeah the axe is something quite symbolic for me in that sense yeah i've Speaker 2 (4:30) been reading back over your interviews over the year and i have to tell you you give very good quote but one of the things that i was interested in in connection to this new this new role for you is when you said people just want newness yeah and i wonder how i wondered how inspirational that had been for you and in creating this collection for mulberry um Speaker 3 (4:52) When did I say that? A long time ago? Speaker 2 (4:54) A long time Speaker 3 (4:54) ago, but Speaker 2 (4:55) it resonated. It did. Speaker 3 (4:57) I mean, me and Tammy, as you know, you've known us for a long time. We've always pushed ourselves to not be trendy. It's like a really dirty word for me because I just want to always do stuff that's very emotional, very emotive in the present. And me and Tammy are always sourcing things that are not necessarily beautiful or they're predictable. But I do think newness is something that as human beings we always love, we always like to see. And for me, this collection, there's definitely moments of fashion, but it's ultimately very wearable. And newness in the sense how we've worked with the leather, newness in the sense how we've worked with the heritage. Because for me, heritage is a foundation, it's not a limitation. So I've really worked with the heritage and taken parts of existing bags or... things that have really resonated with the brand throughout the years to create something new. Did you feel Mulberry was very coded? I think when you're lucky enough for me to go to the Rookery for instance in Somerset where they make the bags, there was a lot of really beautiful archival pieces that kept popping up or and there is codes that not everyone will know but they'll see them and be like oh I remember that and that's always a nice nod to the the heritage, but we've moved it 100 miles, miles ahead in the sense that, oh, it's completely different, but it has that design line or detail, but it's not obvious. It's not like a logo-driven brand, right? For me, the collection is very focused on great cut, great silhouette, and obviously my love of leather, which is, I've always loved leather. Speaker 2 (6:39) See, obviously that's a point that I think people are going to be fascinated by, that Mulberry Codes, which people remember from the bags, they remember from Alexa Chung, and they had their little golden moment. And then your codes are so otherworldly, well, not otherworldly, they're very much of this world, but in a very... Speaker 2 (7:04) In a way that was always so unpredictable. Speaker 3 (7:07) Yeah. And Speaker 2 (7:07) almost perverse. Yeah. Speaker 3 (7:09) In terms of fashion. We Speaker 2 (7:10) loved Speaker 3 (7:10) that. Me and Tammy have always been like private detectives that we've always not went front of house. We've always went underground and Doug D went to the basements to be like, to put like an idea. It's something that I love design to do that. And that's for me the best part of design. is to research. And it's something I learned at college from Professor Louise Wilson. She would literally razor blade you, literally, if you came in with the same reference. So I was always learning to dig deeper, learn more, outsource. But the codes that you saw and you were mentioning, they're not obvious to the eye, but those heydays of the Alexa, there were great times. But I'm thinking of growing up in Glasgow, Motherwell, where the football casuals, the Neds, you would call them, were wearing Mulberry, with other sportswear brands like Chippy or even Burberry. All these things was an amalgamation of street culture, youth culture. So Mulberry was definitely present when I was growing up, but it wasn't the obvious bag. It was the rugby shot or the football. t-shirt and the owner who you know roger was very regional in the sense that he would do things from london but he'd also take them to the towns the country and it's something that we've picked up on is this town city country because Speaker 2 (8:37) i think i do think of mulberry as having that sort of country yeah the the country the british