As teenagers, Stefan Cooke founders Stefan Cooke and Jake Burt were surrounded by Mulberry’s iconic bags. Think Tim Walker’s ethereal Noughties advertising campaigns starring Lindsey Wixson – all fanciful florals and saccharine hues – and shots of Kate Moss carrying every indie girl’s favourite bag, the Bayswater, which celebrated its 20th anniversary last year. So it felt serendipitous when they received a call asking them to collaborate with the British heritage label on Mulberry Editions, a series that launched in 2021 in line with the label’s 50th year, and invites London’s coolest creatives to reinterpret its design DNA. Previous collaborators include Nicholas Daley, Richard Malone, Ahluwalia and Alexa Chung.
Instagram content
Considering the level of hype the collection generated when it dropped in September 2023, it was no surprise that every single bag was snapped up in record time (certain Vogue editors are still mourning the fact that they missed out on nabbing one of these one-of-a-kind totes). So, Stefan Cooke fans will be as happy as the team was to learn that this lust-worthy partnership is back for 2024, with a new line of beautifully upcycled bags all available to shop exclusively at Dover Street Market, both in store and online, from today. Run, don’t walk.
“The response was really incredible and we were so happy because we put so much time and energy into the collaboration,” Cooke says. “Obviously there had been previous iterations with other designers, but this felt like the first of its kind, because it was all about pre-loved bags.”
“The first season was all about experimentation, and the challenge was working out how to make these techniques we developed into luxury crafted bags,” Burt adds. “However the second collection just feels way more confident, as we know what works. I think when people go into Dover Street they’re going to see a new level of refinement in the designs, especially within the context of the installation.”
Cooke and Burt knew they wanted to work with vintage Mulberry bags, beautifully worn from years of use, and so for both collections the duo travelled to The Rookery, one of Mulberry’s two carbon neutral factories in Somerset, to peruse the plethora of second-hand styles stored in stacks of yellow boxes on the shelves. “It felt like Christmas,” smiles Cooke. “We loved the idea of reworking something that physically needed an element of renovation.” For Burt, the visits were also something of a homecoming – he grew up close to Mulberry’s factories.
Centred around Stefan Cooke’s playful yet precise riffs on an adolescent enchantment with indie sleaze, the second drop is packed full of design signatures we’ve come to associate with the brand: bows, braids, slashes and sportswear motifs. All of the pieces – 32 in total – have been reworked using painstaking processes developed via hours of trial and error with Mulberry’s artisans at The Rookery. The surface of a pink Bayswater has been slashed with Cooke’s signature latticework – a deconstructed flourish that is most associated with the brand’s cut-out Argyle knits – while another has been top-stitched with softly folding leather bows that resemble Victorian surface embellishments.
“It feels like we’ve been preparing for an art exhibition – going down to the factory and hand-selecting each bag for its unique patina and creating these one-off pieces,” says Burt. “The collection is about using luxury processes to bring a new layer of meaning to bags that already have individual years of history. Grandmothers restore their old Mulberry bags so they can pass them down to their granddaughters. We hope that in 50 years, someone will pass down one of these bags.” A mission that will surely be accomplished.
