Mulberry returns to RTW with Softie bag-linked outerwear launch

By

Sandra Halliday

Published
Oct 3, 2022

Mulberry’s days as a catwalk brand may be long gone but the company on Monday launched back into full-on ready-to-wear with an outerwear collection that it’s linking closely to its latest star bag line.

This autumn, the Mulberry Softie bag evolves into a new clothing collection, with prices starting at £345, “fusing functionality with a fashion forward sensibility, and style with pragmatism”.

The Softie has become a key product line for Mulberry since its February launch and now its signature details (like the distinctive puffy quilting – have been applied to ready-to-wear in a way that seems like a no-brainer) or “organically translated into a capsule of tactile outerwear”, as the company puts it. 

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The Softie Outerwear collection comprises eight designs: three jackets, a gilet, and two coats (a belted midi style and a full caped design) as well as a scarf and skirt. The Softie quilted bomber, shell jacket, hooded puffer and scarf are genderless/unisex. 

“Chiming with Mulberry’s Made to Last ethos, every piece in the collection is padded with recycled silk and the garment outers crafted from recycled Nylon”, it said. 

As mentioned, the firm sees this as “a natural evolution of the Softie bags”, with it saying the ready-to-wear “possesses the same huggable, textured tactility”. 

Of course, the brand’s signature Postman’s Lock fastenings are peppered throughout the collection, which is available in a palette of black, khaki, Mulberry green and tobacco brown. 

It added that the pieces are “suitably cosy for winter yet lightweight enough for spring [and] transition seamlessly between country and city, encapsulating the synergy between Mulberry’s rural heritage and modern urban slant”.

The campaign that goes with the launch pays “subtle homage to Mulberry’s Somerset roots” and draws on the area’s folkloric heritage. Called Wild Within, it was created in collaboration with “boundary pushing British creatives”, photographer Tom Johnson and stylist Harry Lambert.

The company said it’s “a celebration of Mulberry’s dual identity as a contemporary tastemaker with an equal appreciation for both heritage and innovation”.

And another launch also features in the campaign with the label debuting a series of micro bags, that are “diminutive iterations of some of its iconic Alexa, Bayswater, Amberley and Sadie bags”.