The British high street is staging a return that does not look like the one it made in the noughties. There are no logo T-shirts leading the charge and no discount banners in the windows.
Instead, the names that defined affordable dressing are borrowing the theatre of luxury. Gap has a collection with Victoria Beckham. Marks & Spencer showed a catwalk collection during London Fashion Week with Joan Collins in the front row, then put it on sale immediately with half the pieces under fifty pounds.
The high street is not becoming luxury. It is becoming fluent in luxury’s grammar, and fluency is cheaper to buy than quality.
The results are uneven but real. The company had recorded a twelve per cent sales decline, then announced fifty per cent profit growth in March, with the effect of an October cyber-attack still to be counted.
The most instructive move is at Asos, where the Hollywood stylist Law Roach has been appointed stylist in residence. His influence appears in campaigns and in how the site proposes pieces to wear together.
Asos has added AI styling, virtual try-on and a Buy the Look function, which turns a styling idea into a basket in a single gesture.
