Burberry focuses on heritage and novel characters in new campaign with new focus

Burberry has focused on heritage in its latest campaign, featuring a novel cast of strong British characters and focusing on the UK label’s sturdiest qualitie, in a subtle shifty in strategy.

 
Entitled It’s Always Burberry Weather, a slogan taken from the Burberry archive, referencing the robust elements of the brand’s garments and the unpredictable Brit’ climate.
 
It features seven key styles, each reimagined: the trench, the Harrington, the quilt, the puffer, the parka, the aviator and the duffle. The campaign is the first since the appointment as CEO of Joshua Shulman, the experienced American executive hired to turn around Burberry after several difficult quarters. It’s emphasis on heritage and humor a good indication of the brand’s future strategy.

Shot across London and the British countryside by Alasdair McLellan, It’s Always Burberry Weather is made up of a series of drole and charming  vignettes and portraits. Playing on familiar British iconography and outdoor activity but unexpectedly and with a sense of humor. All photographed on a cast of characters from several generations.
 
Hence, Academy Award- winning actor Olivia Colman – one of three actresses to play the former queen in hit Netflix series The Crown – is captured in a forest green quilt jacket with plaid lining, standing among a group of sheep and before a foam green Range Rover. Like Queen Elizabeth in full country living mode.
 
While brand ambassador and BAFTA Award-winning actor Barry Keoghan plays on his sensitively gritty character by peeping warily over his forearm, attired in juniper green plaid puffer.
 
“Burberry is about protection, functionality and the outdoors. We are always inspired by our archive and the innovation and creativity of the brand. The campaign promotes the house’s silhouettes: protective and enduring,” stressed Burberry’s Chief Creative Officer Daniel Lee in a release.
 
Two of England’s hottest young footballers – Cole Palmer and Eberechi Eze – go fishing, the Chelsea striker in a classic Royal Navy worthy brown duffle with new B shield toggle, posed beside bait. The Crystal Palace forward in windcheater Harrington clutching a rod.

 
The Shelter, a Burberry archive illustration, is revived as a brand signifier from the late 1970s until around the early 1990s. The image – a man and woman standing back-to-back with two dogs – celebrates Burberry’s commitment to protection from the weather.
 
Joining the cast also are model Cara Delevingne, shot before Big Ben in a suede aviator shearling; actor Zhang Jingyi in classic Burberry spy-trench; and BRIT Award-winning musician Simz in a short beige Harrington jacket.
 
The brand is planning  an all-encompassing campaign including cinema ads, global pop-ups, window displays and in-store activations, alongside a revival of an archive illustration.