There’s never a dull moment at London Fashion Week. Aside from being ground zero for some of the wildest designs to grace the catwalks, it’s also a hotbed for considered, enlightening shows that push the envelope for garment design and storytelling alike. Indeed, the city’s melting pot gives way to moving explorations of British-Afro-Caribbean diaspora, subculture and biography, while also making space for formally led experiments in pattern-making, tailoring and material development.

At a time when fashion’s old guard is coming undone across retail, e-commerce and direct-to-consumer selling, the big smoke offers a fresh way of thinking about clothing and consumers, leaning into craft-led design and a by-any-means sensibility. It’s because of this and a series of community networks like Fashion East, NEWGEN and Fantastic Toiles that London’s designers are often ahead of the curve, extending the limits of who fashion is for and how it’s made. 

Below, we meet fashion’s new school – Derrick, Ellen Poppy Hill, Nuba, Steve O Smith, Tolu Coker, Yaku and Loutre – many of whom are showing at London Fashion Week for the first time this season. 

Bridging the gap between capital-F fashion and traditional menswear, Luke Derrick is the Oxford native behind the eponymous London-based label, Derrick. His USP? Making tailoring “relevant” and attuned to the zeitgeist. As such, the Central Saint Martins BA and MA Menswear alum will present his official sophomore collection, supported by the British Fashion Council’s NEWGEN initiative, with innovation at the forefront.

Where A/W24 was steeped in fine melton woollens – specially sourced from Yorkshire’s historic Hainsworth mill – S/S25 promises a deeper dive into his fascination with egalitarian, ubiquitous fabrics. Teased in his debut show, a Japanese nylon taffeta made with recycled fibres will take a leading role, offering waterproof glossiness to suiting that, from afar, might read as fine silk, but upon closer inspection, is actually a rather scrunchable, rugged material.

Elsewhere, Derrick’s keen to put another new discovery to good use. Having happened upon a densely woven Japanese cotton that, in his words, “just holds the silhouette”, the designer will incorporate the naturally bouncy fabric into one of his most efficiently composed jackets. Less really is more where Derrick is concerned. “I love this idea of a fabric evoking something greater than the sum of the parts,” he says. “There’s no canvassing, no fusing, no tricks; it’s just a combination of the right pipe, the right cut and the right fabric.”

Read our interview with Luke Derrick here.

A true bohemian, the southeast London-raised Ellen has been a fixture amongst the city’s grassroots fashion communities for a hot minute. A graduate of CSM’s BA and MA Fashion courses, Ellen also spent her late teens working on the shop floor of Dover Street Market, a fact that makes her upcoming show – a craftier, circular  version of the see-now-buy-now format – all the more special. Yes, for S/S25, her off-schedule catwalk debut, each and every garment seen in the show will be sold via DSM.

In another life, Ellen worked at her local (and now cult) second-hand tailoring store, Cenci, in West Norwood, later interning at Kiko Kostadinov and Knwls. But her vision today is entirely her own, born out of necessity and a deep emotional investment in her practice. Growing up reliant on charity shops, Ellen fell into upcycling naturally – it just so happens to suit her make-do-and-mend approach to design. Spliced and diced garments – blouses built from old jacket linings, antique cotton patchwork dresses and a Judy Blame-esque taste for buttons – have defined her story so far, with her designs often ending up in the infamous roving fashion bazaar, Nasir Mazhar’s Fantastic Toiles.

Her new collection, entitled Constant State of Repair, jibes and honestly describes her physical and emotional relationship with fashion. “My work is definitely personal and sentimental, and it’s quite funny because some people find me tough to get into emotionally,” says Ellen. Confessing to a wardrobe of clothes constantly deteriorating despite her mission belief in preservation, Ellen jokes that “everything will be fixed when I’m fixed.” And so, zips, holes, tape, cutting, pinning and draping will take centre stage as codes and motifs for her big runway outing, referencing her proudly moth-eaten MO.

A welcome addition to Lulu Kennedy’s Fashion East incubator programme, Nuba is the brainchild of two formidable creatives: the CSM MA Menswear alum Cameron Williams, who started working on his label upon graduating in 2020, and photographer and multi-disciplinary artist Jebi Labembika, who joined later as the brand’s co-creative director. Williams is British-Jamaican and Lambembika was born in Cameroon; between them, the London-based creatives blend tailoring with drapework, riffing on their Caribbean and African, mothers’ respective approaches to dressing.

It’s a diasporic story owing a lot to the women they witnessed growing up in south London, whose adaptations on cultural dress in the metropolis translated their nuanced identities. Here, clothing is understood as a compromise and source of protection. Whether it was the pairing of puffer coats or tailoring alongside traditional heritage clothing, such crossovers and assimilation techniques have become the lifeblood of their label, celebrated and tweaked in intricate, winding felted panel down jackets, finely swaddled melton wool hoodies and ingenious pleated crepe maxi skirts that pull and hang just so.

“It’s a constant collaborative process, involving the vision and experiences of us both,” the pair say. For this new collection – their third – the ways in which people socially edit themselves to find belonging serves as the throughline, continuing that same mapping of identity that underpins Nuba. The title, SIM, short for simulation, “investigates and abstracts the way we amplify aspects of our lives and personality to avoid judgement,” they explain.

Read our feature on Nuba here.

It’s easy to forget that clothing designs often start with a comparatively humble ink-on-paper drawing. Granted, the age-old art of sketching before designing no longer reigns supreme – with many opting for digital CAD renders or designing straight onto the body – but, in the case of British-raised designer Steve O Smith, the real creative flourishes start in the blueprint. Recognise the name from pre-pandemic fashion? That’s because Smith had been running his own label for some time, until eventually growing tired of the wholesale business model. He cleansed his Insta grid, wiping the slate for an educational sabbatical at CSM on the MA Fashion. When he graduated in 2022, a collector snaffled up his student collection, and he’s been working away since, building a signature around his doodled, figurative, sometimes wholly abstract drawings that transpose directly onto fine occasion wear.

Nowadays, the NEWGEN recipient is designing for bespoke clients such as Eddie Redmayne, who Steve outfitted for the Met Gala in a black silk overcoat, sliced with squiggled cut outs, revealing a white sheer relief. “It’s great because you get to know people,” says Steve. “They are my drawings, but you’re making them for a specific person.” In this vein, Steve’s (post-cleanse) fashion week debut last season was held as a by-appointment event in Paris. This season, following on from A/W24’s core inspiration, artist George Grosz, Steve has looked to the expressionists, inspired by an ongoing Tate Modern exhibition dedicated to Kandinsky, Gabriele Münter and the Blue Rider group.

Around Easter time, Smith put in a prolific drawing stint, drafting for three weeks on the trot before coming up with all the drawings for this upcoming collection on the last day. From there, spurred on by his Met requirements, he began developing his techniques – using markers, creating a card marker and painting with starch on silk – which have made the final result one finely defined (and lined) collection.

This season, the Nigerian-British designer, Tolu Coker, will present her third collection under the NEWGEN initiative, channelling Yoruba spiritualism and west London cool into one, glorious cocktail of Sunday Best and deadstock fabrics. Since graduating CSM BA Fashion and Textile Print in 2017, the designer has leaned into her diasporic heritage, charting the inherently resourceful approaches native to Nigeria and surrounding nations.

Her mother, for example, spent her youth in Lagos working as a “hawker”, selling what she could on the streets. After witnessing this culture for herself on a visit to Ghana, Coker further dissected this practice of recycling, while also exploring the Nigerian Pidgin many cant hawkers speak. For her, they were prime examples of savvy African innovation. Naturally, this centred the A/W24 collection, entitled Broken English, which saw oxblood reclaimed leather trenches, dandified millinery and plenty of sharp, women’s tailoring descend down the runway. Suitcases in repurposed satin – primed with traditional prints – joined corseted mini dresses, woven, circular accessories and peppy, patterned denims.

For S/S25, Coker not so much proposes a radically new theme but instead approaches her show as a continuation of the broader, cultural conversation core to her brand. “The Yoruba people have a really rich legacy of craftsmanship which I think is at the root of sustainable luxury fashion,” says Coker. “There are pieces of the collection that have simply been pulled from previous collections. The narrative is about building upon the existing wardrobe and, again, valuing that which you already have – the pieces you’ve invested in.”

After graduating CSM’s MA Fashion in 2023, the St Albans-born Yaku Stapleton has gone from strength to strength, landing his designs in esteemed stockists like DSM London, Machine-A, SSENSE and Tokyo’s stalwart boutique, Oops Clothing. With an aesthetic rooted in Runescape characters and Afro-futurist philosophy, Stapleton imagines new worlds, threading together rich storylines with his own family as the protagonists. In practice, this manifests as hulking, lofted silhouettes padded in upcycled bedding, sportswear textured with reptilian skin and models wielding all manner of fantastical mediaeval weapons – axes, hammers, the lot. The designer sits somewhere between sci-fi costume and the natural conclusion to techwear. Developing his practice, he’s decided to take a hard look at his personal realities (as well as optimistic futures), a move which began when he won the Swedish Fashion Council’s Challenge the Fabric Award. For this, he imagined a limitless version of his older brother, Elliott, confronting his dark past. His S/S25 presentation, shown as part of NEWGEN, will see the rest of his family confront their pasts in a journey of self-discovery.

His work begins by first drawing out the storylines and character boards. From there, these are transposed into mock-ups, a process that started with clay, followed by papier-mâché on dolls, and nowadays, comprises plasticine sculpted on top of Barbies. The typical tropes of RPG video games – pixelation and low-poly characters – are directly referenced in the garments, although increasingly, he’s embracing the fluidity of prehistoric and current natural life, as reflected in this season’s material choices. Despite an increasingly darker synopsis, the sense of play and humour that has made his aesthetic so alluring remains. “It’s less and more serious at the same time,” says Stapleton. “It’s smarter pattern-cutting, which allows us to construct better garments but at the same time lets us execute shapes and forms that are more reflective of the source characters – which ends up being quite humorous.” The title of his new outing? The ImPossible Family Reunion in RPG Space Chapter 4: Looking Back to Look Forward to Look Back Again.

Joining the ranks alongside Nuba at Fashion East, Loutre is multi-hyphenate creator Pia Schiele’s label. Loutre is an almost solely upcycled offering that gives contemporary (and slightly more graceful) skaters an opportunity to look directional without compromising on the hardwearing, boxy and baggy rigour they expect. From regenerated, cable-knitted patchwork sweaters and ear-flap hats to cosy, cotton hand-tie-dyed jeans, Pia’s designs are always lightly avant-garde, yet casual enough to form a natural part of any Southbanker’s uniform.

A self-taught designer with a dab hand for lookbook photography, Schiele was born and raised in Germany, later moving to Australia where she got deep into the surf scene. Still spurred by her wanderlust, she then ended up in the UK – east London, to be specific – falling in with a motley crew of skaters. Today, her high-functioning wardrobe has garnered a following among her native community and beyond, earning her a well-deserved spot in DSM London.

For Loutre, the devil is always in the detail. A cheeky step hem at the cuff of a pant, a satin trim crossing the legs or simply the addition of a double pleat … Her flourishes go a long way in making some of the most achingly nonplussed dressers look elegant on a halfpipe or at the pub. “I have a BA in design and photography, and over time, my career naturally shifted towards fashion,” says Schiele. “I think once you start working consistently, you’re bound to develop your own personal language, and interests aren’t always linear.” What’s in store for the brand’s new show? A womenswear first and formal wear. “I’m really grateful that the Fashion East team has been 100 percent behind this development,” she says.