For Kent & Curwen’s centennial, creative director Daniel Kearns looked beyond the brand’s archive of club ties and cricket blazers. His Fall 2026 collection, presented in London, draws from a clandestine Cambridge University tradition: ‘night climbing,’ where students scale college facades under cover of darkness. This subversive thread in British history connects directly to lingerie’s own narrative of concealment, revelation, and social rebellion.
The practice, famously undertaken by Lord Byron, mirrors the intimate garment’s evolution from private necessity to public statement. Just as these climbers operated in shadow, early 20th-century lingerie from houses like Cadolle—founded in 1889—was designed for structural support beneath layers, a hidden architecture. Kearns’s designs, featuring capes inspired by Byron and sculptural pleating from academic gowns, play with this duality of cover and exposure.
Owned since 2023 by China’s Biemlofen, Kent & Curwen under Kearns is expanding its classic menswear codes into womenswear with a playful, collegiate energy. Cropped trenches, Aran knits adorned with the brand’s rose, and short tweed skirts speak to a youthful irreverence. This shift echoes how brands like La Perla, founded in 1954, later transformed lingerie from foundation into fashion, making the private deliberately visible. Kearns isn’t just designing clothes; he’s tapping into a long history of garments that challenge perspective, whether seen under moonlight or bedroom light.
Originally reported by WWD