Autumn / Winter 2021

S.S.DALEY presents its autumn/winter 21 collection, exploring the intimacy and powerplays of British public-school culture. Steven Stokey-Daley is proudly working class from Liverpool, his work a critique of the elitist traditionalism of private education, and the intimate bonds of school that go on to form the power structures of the ruling elite.

This is his first full collection since graduating from the BA Fashion course at the University of Westminster in summer 2020, these new pieces an Act II to his graduate collection.

“This collection continues to explore the language of masculinity and dressing at Harrow and Eton schools from my own working-class viewpoint. It’s about those boys suddenly having time on their hands, the intimacy of how they indulge in leisure,” says Steven Stokey-Daley.

For this Act II, Stokey-Daley expands the vocabulary of its work, grounded in the proportion play of his signature oversized Oxford bags. Garments are queered, outerwear comes into focus, while fabrics continue to be upcycled, or sourced locally from responsible mills in the UK.

A tailored silk suit has a jacket cut for leisure with its broad peaked lapel, the ultra-wide trousers held by a tie that’s reminiscent of cricket pad fastening brought to the front. The silk has been specially woven for Stokey-Daley by a traditional mill in Yorkshire. An outerwear shirt jacket is cut from Melton wool, its vertical pockets a reference to a countryman’s wax jacket. The same Melton wool is used for pleat shorts, and a great coat with a collar almost as wide as the fitted shoulder.

Smocking is a recurrent theme, like the green silk oversized shirt, with a dropped shoulder and smocking down both sides of the front placket, or a white oversized shirt that’s hand-smocked with the exaggerated pleats of a dress shirt. Meanwhile a table-cloth shirt is one-of-a-kind, an ongoing project for Stokey-Daley.

Florals are reminiscent of interiors captured in Cecil Beaton photography, like expansive Oxford bags or a regatta trench coat cut from home furnishing fabric. A ditzy floral print is used on a shirt in lightweight tropical wool, its pocket secured by a tie inspired by a cricket cap. Ribbed singlets and vests evoke the intimate mood of athletes at rest, while a calf-length silk dressing gown is cut to follow the lines of a donkey jacket, with its low front yoke. Meanwhile a T-shirt has a tile print featuring birds and pears, the fruit beloved grown by Stokey-Daley’s Nan.

An oversized cardigan is created from chunky cable knit, worn with Melton wool trousers felted with panels of chunky cable knit. Equally special is a corduroy blazer decorated with hand-crochet roses, a surrealist take on a classic Cecil Beaton image and an essay in privilege, queerness and leisure.