International Desk, Bangladesh Global: From the first ever Barbour jacket to a dress worn by Princess Diana and a velvet smoking cap created for Winston Churchill – the garments that help define British identity are on show in the exhibition Icons of British Fashion at Blenheim Palace.
"Show me the clothes of a country, and I can write its history," the author Anatole France once said. As a cultural identity, "Britishness" is amorphous, and a mass of contradictions – no-nonsense but with a love of pomp; buttoned-up but also rebellious; pragmatic but peacockish; sensible but hedonistic; serious but humorous. The clothes and accessories on display in a new exhibition at Blenheim Palace, Icons of British Fashion, have an inherent connection with the history of "Britishness" – a phrase that means different things to different people, and that is open to endless interpretation, not to mention mythologising.
"A love of storytelling is central to British fashion identity," Amy de la Haye, professor, curator and writer at the London College of Fashion tells the BBC. "This is partly due to the museum visits and fashion history our fashion designers experience at art school. Many of Britain's most innovative designers have a strong sense of history, personal and community identities, landscape, literature and politics. Concept and process are central to their expression."
Of course, it's not all roses and unicorns in the world of British fashion – look no further than the behaviour of designer John Galliano (whose work is also on display in the exhibition).
Here are nine garments from the Icons of British Fashion exhibition that – in one way or another – embody Britishness.
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