Les fondateurs de Burberry
Thomas Burberry never owned a trench coat. He died in 1926, before the Trench became the Trench — before Bogart wore one in Casablanca, before it appeared on every London street corner in November. What he did own was a draper's shop in Basingstoke and a conviction that waterproof cloth should breathe.
In 1856, at twenty-one, Burberry opened T. Burberry and Sons on Winchester Street. He sold ready-made outdoor clothing to farmers, sportsmen, and anyone who spent significant time in Hampshire rain. The work was practical, not romantic. A draper in mid-Victorian England stocked tweed, serge, and heavy cotton. Burberry stocked those too, but he kept returning to a problem: waterproof fabric trapped moisture inside. A man could stay dry from the rain and still end up soaked from his own sweat.
By 1879, he had an answer. Gabardine was a tightly woven twill, usually cotton, treated before weaving rather than coated after. The result was a cloth that repelled water on the surface but allowed air to pass through. It was lighter than oilcloth, stronger than untreated cotton, and it didn't crack in cold weather. Burberry patented it in 1888. The name came from gaberdine, Middle English for a long, loose garment worn by pilgrims and shepherds. The spelling changed — one 'e' dropped, one letter doing the work of two.
Gabardine found its first serious audience in exploration and the military. In 1893, Fridtjof Nansen wore Burberry on his Arctic expedition. In 1901, the company supplied clothing for Captain Scott's Discovery expedition to Antarctica. Ernest Shackleton followed in 1907. Roald Amundsen reached the South Pole in 1911 wearing a Burberry anorak. These were not endorsements in the modern sense. Burberry supplied functional gear to men who needed it, and those men survived, which was endorsement enough.
The British Army took notice. In 1914, the War Office commissioned an officer's raincoat. Burberry and Aquascutum both claim credit for the design; the truth is that several manufacturers contributed variations, and the final garment was a composite. What matters is that Burberry's version — single-breasted, belted, with epaulettes and D-rings — became the template. The coat was worn in trenches, hence the name, though it was designed for officers who spent more time in command posts than in mud. After the war, officers kept wearing them. So did everyone else.
Thomas Burberry understood branding before the word meant what it does now. In 1901, he commissioned a logo: a knight in armour carrying a flag embroidered with the word Prorsum, Latin for forwards. The Equestrian Knight, as it became known, appeared on labels, adverts, and storefronts. It suggested chivalry, progress, and a certain Englishness that appealed to Edwardian customers. Burberry was selling more than cloth. He was selling a version of Britain that felt stable, capable, and prepared for bad weather.
He was also selling to women. By the 1900s, Burberry offered tailored skirts, driving coats, and walking suits in gabardine. These were not decorative garments. They were cut for movement, designed for women who played golf, drove motorcycles, or simply refused to stay indoors when it rained. Burberry's womenswear anticipated the 1920s by two decades — practical, unembellished, built for activity rather than display.
Thomas Burberry died in 1926, three years after the company moved its headquarters to Haymarket. His sons took over. The business expanded through the mid-century, opening stores in Paris, New York, and Buenos Aires. The trench remained central, but Burberry also produced raincoats for children, gabardine suits for men, and a growing line of accessories. In 1924, the company introduced a lining — camel, red, black, and white check — that became as recognisable as the coat itself. The check was originally designed to button into Burberry trench coats as a removable layer. It became a houseprint by accident, or at least without the deliberate marketing that would define it later.
By the 1970s, Burberry was a heritage brand in the way that phrase is usually meant: respected, reliable, and fading. The trench still sold, but the company had not kept pace with the ready-to-wear revolution. Licensing deals proliferated. The check appeared on umbrellas, scarves, and eventually everything else. In Japan, Burberry became shorthand for a certain kind of aspirational Britishness. In Britain, it became shorthand for something else — a houseprint worn so widely it lost its exclusivity.
The turnaround began in 1997, when Rose Marie Bravo joined as chief executive. She hired Christopher Bailey in 2001. Bailey, who had trained at the Royal College of Art and worked under Donna Karan and Gucci's Tom Ford, understood that Burberry's strength was not in reinvention but in focus. He narrowed the product range, pulled back licenses, and centred the collection on outerwear. The trench was recut in new fabrics — leather, python, lace. The check was used sparingly, often as a lining rather than a surface. Burberry's advertising, shot by Mario Testino, featured British actors and models in rain-slicked streets. The message was clear: this was a luxury house, not a diffusion line.
Bailey became chief creative officer in 2009 and chief executive in 2014. Under his direction, Burberry embraced digital retail earlier than most European houses. The brand live-streamed runway shows, launched an e-commerce platform that mirrored in-store inventory, and allowed customers to pre-order pieces immediately after they appeared on the runway. These moves sound obvious now. In 2010, they were not.
Riccardo Tisci succeeded Bailey in 2018. Tisci, who had spent twelve years at Givenchy, brought a darker, more graphic sensibility. He replaced the Equestrian Knight with a new logo designed by Peter Saville, and introduced a monogram — interlocking T and B — that referenced Thomas Burberry's initials. The check was reimagined in new colourways. The trench remained, but it shared space with oversized parkas, nylon bombers, and logo-heavy streetwear. Tisci's Burberry leaned into logomania at a moment when logomania was, once again, selling.
Daniel Lee arrived in 2022. Lee, who had redefined Bottega Veneta between 2018 and 2021, brought a quieter approach. His first collection for Burberry stripped back the logos and returned to the archive — not as pastiche, but as raw material. Trench coats appeared in new proportions, cut closer to the body or exaggerated in the shoulder. Outerwear was paired with tailored trousers and leather skirts. The check was still there, but recessed, used as a detail rather than a statement. Lee's Burberry felt more like a London atelier than a global megabrand, which was, perhaps, the point.
What remains of Thomas Burberry is not a man but a method. Gabardine is still woven to his specifications. The trench is still cut with a storm shield and throat latch, even though most customers never button either. The house he founded has been reinterpreted by a dozen creative directors, but the core offer has not changed: a coat that works in bad weather, and looks better because of it. That is not heritage. That is function, which lasts longer.
