Daniel Lee brings Burberry’s heritage into a new era through a vibrant collaboration with British textile legend Celia Birtwell.

To close London Fashion Week, <a href="https://www.lofficielsingapore.com/living/burberry-takes-over-the-standard-bangkok-for-summer-fashion-event-news-celebrities" title="Burberry Takes Over The Standard, Bangkok for Summer" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Burberry</a> celebrated its 170th anniversary not with a conventional retrospective, but with a meeting of two distinctly British creative voices. <a href="https://www.lofficielsingapore.com/fashion/burberry-fall-winter-2026-collection-london-fashion-week-runway-celebrities-stray-kids-seungmin" title="Burberry Closes London Fashion Week With a Trench-Focused Homecoming" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Creative director Daniel Lee</a> joined forces with renowned textile and print designer Celia Birtwell, whose work has shaped British fashion and popular culture since the 1960s.
The collaboration brought Birtwell’s distinctive prints together with Lee’s modern take on <a href="https://www.lofficielsingapore.com/fashion/exclusive-twice-nayeon-jung-eun-chae-burberry-unexpected-encounters-campaign-celebrity-interview-bright-seungmin" title="Exclusive! TWICE's Nayeon &amp; Jung Eun-chae On Burberry’s ‘The Unexpected Encounters’" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Burberry</a>, creating a collection that looked to the past while firmly keeping its focus on the present. Among the guests at the show were Jonathan Bailey, Bright, i-dle's SHUHUA, Son Suk-ku and Wu Lei.
For Lee, the collaboration began with a simple meeting. He first met Birtwell in May and was immediately struck by her energy and enthusiasm. “I’d never collaborated with anyone on a show before,” he said backstage. “It’s something you only find when you find it.”

The starting point was deliberately unexpected. Rather than relying heavily on Birtwell’s famous floral motifs, Lee encouraged her to explore something different. The result was a series of original prints featuring fragmented faces in optimistic colours, checks, mimosas and motifs with a playful, almost Eastern-inspired quality.
One particular face print became the creative spark for the collection. Lee described it as optimistic and joyful, and it ultimately helped establish the colour palette that ran throughout the show.
The fabric story was just as distinctive. While Burberry is historically synonymous with gabardine, Lee chose to build much of the collection around silk taffeta, transforming the luxurious fabric into trench coats, overcoats and rain jackets.&nbsp;The choice was rooted in the spirit of Birtwell’s earlier work with her former husband, designer Ossie Clark. Lee saw a connection between the simplicity of the fabric and Clark’s approach to clothing. Even when the collection moved into more couture-inspired territory, he wanted the clothes to retain a practical quality.
“I wanted the couture elements to still have a sense of utility,” Lee explained, “which is why the silhouettes remain coats, shirts, pencil skirts. That’s who we really are.”

That balance between luxury and everyday wear was also evident in the collection’s deliberately imperfect details. Creased fabrics, uneven finishes and washed surfaces were treated not as flaws, but as part of the design.
“When we buy a luxury item, we all seek something to cherish,” Lee said. “Wrinkles and imperfections make things more human.”&nbsp;It was an approach that gave the collection a more personal quality, shifting the idea of luxury away from flawless industrial perfection and towards something more tactile and human.
The unmistakable energy of London was also woven into the show. Central Cee, who appeared among the models, brought the sense of urban toughness that Lee sees as essential to the city’s identity.&nbsp;“I always look for a bit of tone, a bit of London, because that’s what this city represents,” Lee said.
The soundtrack reinforced that sense of British cultural history and reinvention. Opening with experimental tracks by David Bowie before moving into familiar classics, it echoed the collection’s central idea: an archive can be respected without being left untouched.
For Burberry’s 170th anniversary, Lee ultimately chose not to simply look backwards. Instead, he brought together two generations of British creativity and allowed heritage, print, fabric and London attitude to evolve into something new.

<h4 style="text-align: center;">BURBERRY SPRING/SUMMER 2027 SHOW</h4>

Burberry Summer 2027​

Celebrities at Burberry's Spring/Summer 2027 Show

Daniel Lee Reinvents Burberry with Celia Birtwell’s Iconic Prints For SS27

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