An explosion of tartans, checks, plaids and tweeds brought British country style and outdoor chic living to the forefront for fall 2024.
For her lauded Chloé debut, Chemena Kamali plucked a fall 1978 runway image from the archives to inspire her plaid dusters, cinched with a belt that had the Chloé name handwritten in gold metal. During a preview, WWD international editor Miles Socha observed the designer loved the image so much, she “practically hugged it.”
“It’s a period I find extremely relevant because a lot of the codes and values were established in that era,” she said. “It was so much about joy and freedom.”
Meanwhile, at Dior, Maria Grazia Chiuiri was taken with the sporty and sleek ‘60s, a huge trend this season, showing windowpane check skirt suits that “channeled the era’s mix of confidence and ease,” wrote WWD Paris bureau chief Joelle Diderich.
Yohji Yamamoto took cubism as inspiration for suits, dresses and outerwear, “their shapes slowly distorted as they were dissected into cubic units,” wrote WWD’s Lily Templeton. More literally, cubes informed his use of plaids and other geometric woven fabrics, bringing to mind the works of Georges Braque and Pablo Picasso.
The celebration of the outdoors that started during the pandemic continued at Daniel Lee’s glamping-inspired show for Burberry. He said he wanted his pieces “to feel durable and functional, and go hand in hand with a trenchcoat.”
And while dreamy chiffon gowns are an Alberta Ferretti signature, the designer balanced them with a number of beautiful tweed pantsuits and sophisticated tailored coats, which WWD Milan bureau chief Luisa Zargani felt better reflected her reputation as a “concrete and pragmatic woman.”
Jonathan Anderson always finds the whimsy in the known, case-in-point an enlarged prince-of-Wales printed knit dress at Loewe that bleeds into black.