The latest Royal Ascot Style Guide has embraced recycled fashion, offering up stylish edits on pre-loved, vintage and rental outfits to suit every budget – and is even encouraging racegoers to ‘raid grandma’s hat box and scour charity shops’.
The racing event, which this year takes place from June 20th to June 24th and is seen by many as the calendar highlight of the British summer season, published its annual fashion guide, the 12th of its kind, today.
Renamed The Royal Ascot Lookbook, the guide offers ideas and inspiration for spectators attending the society meet and this year includes six bold edits: Luxe, Tailoring, Pre-Loved & Rental, Vintage, High Street and Emerging Designer.
Organisers said the Lookbook, which was shot by fashion photographer Damian Foxe and styled by Luke Jefferson Day, ‘sees the British racing institution take a new direction’, which ‘encapsulates the zeitgeist of occasion wear dressing for the spring/summer 2023 season.’
Brands featured include the likes of Gucci, Jaquemus, Charles Jeffery LOVERBOY, Favourbrook and S.S Daley, as well as sustainable rental pieces from HURR.
The event said they want spectators – some 60,000 on a daily basis – to ‘look beyond the rules and regulations to dream up an outfit which is authentic to personal style and shopping habits, that can suit every budget’ and hoped the historic Berkshire course would be ‘brimming with colour and energy’ come June.
Felicity Barnard, Commercial Director, Ascot Racecourse said: ‘There are very few events that allow people to embrace dressing for a special occasion on such a global scale and each year Royal Ascot becomes the most followed display of sartorial elegance and individual flair – a true celebration of style that is woven into the very fabric of Ascot’s DNA.’
She added: ‘I look forward to seeing the racecourse brimming with colour and energy as we head into the spring/summer season.’
After embracing traditional formalwear for decades, the historic event eased the previously strict sartorial guidelines in 2022 to include a higher hem for ladies.
While formality remains in the Royal Enclosure, a more relaxed approach is now allowed elsewhere, with exuberant occasion wear positively encouraged.
The pre-loved and rental edits in this year’s Lookbook focus firmly on sustainable fashion – including hireable outfits from brands including HURR, Selfridges Rental, Moss Bros and Oliver Brown.
The Lookbook’s Luxe edit shows off more expensive, cutting-edge couture with gowns by Roksanda, mirrored suiting by Gucci and a new take on three-piece morning dress by Favourbrook.
A Vintage edit features 1980s skirt suits by Thierry Mugler, preppy blazers by Vivienne Westwood and flamboyant fuchsia silhouettes, while a High Street edit offers up outfits from LK Bennett, Sandro, All Saints and Reformation.
Source: dailymail.co.uk
