This battle of the retail institutions comes at a time when the high street is saturated with collaborations. This season alone there is Barbour x Alexa Chung, Cult Gaia x Gap, Roxanda x George at Asda, Clare Waight Keller jewellery for Reformation, Tabitha Simmonds x Next, Reiss x Les 100 Ciels, Farm Rio x Adidas… each is trying to entice customers to buy something newsworthy, and now – these limited edition products might be gone tomorrow.
M&S finally work out what customers want
In fact they’re having such a moment, the original high street collaborators are making a return too: Zara is launching a partywear collection with Kate Moss in November, harking back to the glory days of 2007, when the supermodel joint forces with Topshop in a launch that shut down half of London’s Oxford Street.
To stand out now, a collaboration needs to tick several boxes: wearability, affordability and desirability. M&S has all of that, but the real X-factor with the Bella Freud slogan knits, the one which sold me, is that they’re in the same font as the £300 versions; you can really pass them off as designer.