Designer's History
Thomas Burberry, founder of the brand, was born in 1835 in Great Britain. Being passionate about hunting and sports in general, he would often frequent the rural environment. It is in this situation that he quickly realized that clothes were not always suitable for the working environment. While being sick, his doctor told him to remove his jacket in rubber which was not good for his health since the material did not allow him to breath. After several year and as a consequence, Thomas decides to open a little shop in Basingstoke in order to find and sale the most practical clothes being waterproof but breathable in the same time. In 1880, he will finally create the famous Gabardine material. Being successful thanks to his innovation, Mr. Burberry will move to London to open his first store in 1891 and become famous in the whole country. In 1919 he is even declared official dresser of the Court of the King Edouard VII. He expanded his business until being compared to one of the largest branded clothing business in Great Britain.
Thomas died in Hook in 1926, leaving the brand and the whole business to his two sons, Thomas Newman and Arthur Michael. However, the two sons will never play a major role in the designer history of the British brand.
Burberry will have to wait until the beginning of the twenty first century to see a real change into the brand image. The next player in the designer story of Burberry will be Roberto Menichetti, an American designer who arrived into the house in 1998. Before Burberry, Roberto used to work during five years for Jil Sander in the design and research team. This American native born in Buffalo, studied in Perugia where he obtained a master degree from the Academy of Fine Arts in Perugia. Nowadays, Roberto creates his own design living between Los Angeles and his own the Menichetti atelier located in Italy.
He played a role in bringing Burburry’s image to a “world class fashion house” but will not stay long enough to change as much as possible the positioning of the brand.
The next fashion designer is the most important player and still the actual one: Christopher Bailley. On his concern, Burberry uses a not-so-common strategy concerning its artistic direction. Christopher Bailey, the actual designer as two statuses: he is both the general artistic director of the British brand and the general director of Burberry. No one in the past, at Burberry or in any other luxury brand, ever had such two positions at the same time.
Christopher Bailey is obviously a major actor in the success of the brand. He is known to have changed a lot the brand since its arrival and to be a key player in the recent success.
Christopher Bailey is a British citizen who was born in Yorkshires in 1971. Since he was born, drawing has always interested him. As a kid, he was always carrying a small notebook were he could have all his sketches. Thanks to his drawing teacher who quickly saw his unique talent in primary school, Christopher sent some of his work to different Art Schools
In 1994, he successfully graduated from the Royal College of Art with a Master in Fashion. His first work experiences were with Donna Karan and then with Gucci during five years as Senior Designer of the women wear division, where he will collaborate with Tom Ford.
Right after these two experiences, Christopher wanted to go back to his home country and he was looking for opportunities in London. This is why he entered the famous British brand in 2001 as a design director as he was seen to have a global vision of fashion in accordance with all the aspect of Burberry. Not only in charge of artistic creation of the different brands: Thomas Burberry, Prorsum and Burberry, Christopher is also in charge of the global image the communication and the merchandising of the boutiques.
Thanks to his new vision of fashion, he will quickly give a new life to the brand that use to experience some business difficulties. He creates a new glamorous and more chic image of the brand. The great success comes from the fact that the new image he created attracted more and more a younger generation of consumers. Without forgetting the heritage of Burberry, Christopher made the bet to re-design the “Trench Coat” in a manner in which all young new consumers are now willing to wear.
It also thank to Christopher that the tartan came back on the catwalk. With little and very chic apparition, he made this pattern coming back as a trend.
In 2007, he created the Children line of Burberry, with clothes and accessories for baby from 0 to children of 10 years old.
In 8 years, Christopher Bailey was able to recover the Burberry brand at a good level by mixing modernity and style. The brand has again become prestigious and found back its innovative talent coming from its origins. Thanks to him, the brand is now more modern and it also follow in a closer way the trends. This aspect is clearly visible with the different celebrities being the ambassador of the Brisith brand.
All of these years, Christopher Bailey’s talent has clearly been recognized. The creator received many awards. For instance he received the famous “Designer of the Year” award, awarded by the British Fashion Awards in 2005.
More recently, in mid-2014, Christopher Bailey has been appointed CEO of Burberry, replacing the famous previous Angela Ahrendts with which he closely worked during many years. It is the first time in the history of the fashion industry that the same person has both the titles of artistic director and CEO. Right after this attribution, Christopher created a new role in the company: Chief Designer Officer whic he gave to Luc Goidadin since he has been working with him since more than 12 years.
