My thoughts on John Alexander Skelton Autumn Winter 2025:
Like every great celebration, the show began with music.
Once the first model walked slowly around the room in silence, he took his place on the church stage. With a fiddle cradled in his arms, his tune filled the modest East London Hall, warbling high, effervescent renditions of folk songs that made you want to clap and stomp your feet. Whistles rang through the air, peppered by the whoops and cheers of an excited crowd.
What followed was a stream of Skelton’s boys: intrinsically tough yet tender, in earth-toned tailoring and 19th-century-inspired workwear.
One by one the models teetered onto the stage in spectacular pagan straw hats, which they removed and ceremoniously lined up. Made in collaboration with hat maker Rachel Frost, the designs were replicas of traditional Irish straw boy masks from the 1920's, woven by hand from ‘oat straw’ into contemporary Skelton-sculptures. Frost explained to me that the duo had worked to “create a joyful story of clothing shaped by life, bidding farewell to winter and ushering in spring.”
Although midwinter had passed, the ritual reflected the same type of celebration and festivity that marks this point in the year. The fiddler’s buoyant song danced through bunting and along tables laid with candles, foliage and ceramic flagons, ringing merrily.
John Skelton has carved out a place as Britain’s prophet of folkloric fashion. Eschewing the rigid tempo of fashion week, the Yorkshire-born designer patterns his worlds on his own terms—staging off-kilter performances where clothing is not just displayed but enacted, where the audience, at times, becomes part of the unfolding tale.
Collection XVIII is directly inspired by Paradise Lost: not John Milton's work but a book of paintings from the Victorian era of 1850-1914. This Paradise Lost depicts the English countryside uncultivated, as the artists knew it before England’s shift from farm to factory and its consequent loss of wildlife, flora and fauna. Through his use of handwoven textiles, natural dyeing techniques and traditional tailoring methods, Skelton actively resists this loss. limited production runs, artisanal craftsmanship, and an emphasis on longevity—directly opposes fast fashion’s throwaway culture, embodying the message of Paradise Lost in a tangible way.
It felt as though many of the looks had stepped straight out of Paradise Lost and onto the runway. Rustic browns, auburns, and mottled khakis were interrupted only by the occasional accent of deep ocean blue and shining scarlet neckerchiefs, features that feel aligned with nature’s own finer details- a golden line of sunlight or a splash of yellow gorse flower.
Mottled cotton frock coats were finished with signature black buttons, fastened playfully to show off delicately embroidered blooming floral waistcoats.
Skelton works purely with materials that are naturally occurring. English wools, Irish linens, hemp and small amounts of hand-woven Indian cottons create a rich tapestry of colours and textures within Collection 18. This patchwork jumper, for instance, is made from two types of Hebridean woollen yarns, celebrating the natural colourations of the sheep. Between themselves, each look holds something of a ripple effect in fabrics due to a mixture of wools.
Skelton’s clothes are often described as nostalgic or rooted in heritage, an observation I understand but don’t completely agree with. I say this as beneath each collection runs a distinctly modern current. There is no allegiance to a particular crowd, no intention to dress a certain type of person. The work exists on its own terms—those who understand it will wear it as they wish.
His garments stand in quiet defiance of fast fashion, echoing the endurance and poetry of Britain’s ancient stone circles, reshaped to his contemporary vision.
If Collection XVIII proved anything, it’s that John Skelton is dancing to his own tune- and very beautifully at that.