“It’s just clothes.” That’s what an editor said to me about Phoebe Philo’s various alphabet spaghetti-monikered collections over the past few years. She meant that as the highest of compliments, and she is both right and wrong. Philo’s clothes are just clothes, presented in a direct way freed of the demands of catwalk theatrics. Those don’t have to mean Galliano-level histrionics – in the attention-grabbing petri-dish of a show, just as big gets even bigger, minimalism gets more minimal, sloppy sloppier, etc etc. Philo’s clothes, by contrast, are quietly unveiled in lookbooks and dropped incrementally (the latest, Collection E, begins deliveries in June). They have a resolute reality to them.
They are also influential. While Philo’s work for Celine continues to be pored over for influence. Furry shoes, which Philo basically invented in 2012 (via Méret Oppenheim’s 1936 gazelle-smothered teacup, but still) have emerged as a micro-trend, and three of her former colleagues now head different major fashion houses – Daniel Lee at Burberry, Matthieu Blazy at Chanel, and Michael Rider back at Celine. Her own label designs have resonated, with similar heft. Her iffy, off fits, twisted fullness around the body, her use of industrial fastenings, and small touches like blunt-toe shoes and weird jewellery (especially her cluster earrings) have all filtered into other designers’ collections since Philo launched herself back into the fashion industry three years ago. Essentially, they’ve become the fashion of our time. Accordingly, the label’s turnover tripled in 2025, consisting of women (and men, including me) reacting to the rightness of what she does, and not a few copyists grabbing pieces to rip off at various levels.
So here is more. Collection E, however, is trickier, much ado about specific fabrications, some washed (“loved” in the Philo phraseology), some pressed into stiff ridges as if freshly unpacked from a longer and pressurised slumber, others just plainly expensive, like different weights of leather and various treatments of shearling. That material occurs frequently, in long-haired form with tips dyed in variegated shades of blonde and brunette, or in weird colours like black cherry or inky blue. Those petroleum, vaguely 1980s hues are a mood of the upcoming season as a whole, and Philo is plugged in – there was also a tart acid yellow, best in a chewed-up looking wool melange, and a red the colour of dried and scabbing blood. Often, the luxurious fabrics are cut into unconventionally casual shapes, frequently tracksuits or pyjamas – there are trousers to the former in parachute-fine leather or a cashmere velvet, and the shearling is shaved into drawstring pyjamas, and coats that look like hotel dressing gowns. There are also what Philo calls ‘Utility twinsets’, which are actually matching big trousers and bigger shirts in cotton, like industrial uniforms.
Philo originally described her collection as “a seasonless, continuous body of work”, which is why a few things feel reassuringly familiar – the Strap trousers, for instance, were offered a few seasons ago in grey and here in black, for those who regret not buying them the first time around. A cropped bomber jacket is proposed in brown leather, versus cognac or black nylon before. There’s a navy cotton utility jacket with big patched pockets that Philo proposed before, in brown – Google that, and see its dozen or so rip-offs currently in rotation.
Philo’s swings hard when it comes to ideas for evening – namely because, after a fashion (and, indeed awards) season of ‘done-ness’, of elaborate dresses and feathers and furs and draping, they are so resolutely down-at-heel. Long dresses either resemble lingerie, or elongated T-shirts. A short-sleeved one is in shiny silk, while another has long sleeves but is barcoded with transparent panels. Those include one across the breasts, and the style is called ‘Stacked’, which counters anyone claiming Philo doesn’t have a sense of humour. Likewise, leather bib-and-brace waders with all the trimmings are worn over bared skin as a slightly tough-sell alternative to an evening dress. There are also tuxedo trousers dragging an incongruous train off one leg, which is actually structured with crin and boning to hold its weight. It’s worn with a cotton T-shirt that resembles army underwear, with patches on its shoulder. God, it would be great if someone had worn that to the Oscars.
