Simone Rocha's Autumn 2021 Collection Celebrates "Fragile Rebels" With Lots of Leather and Tulle

Simone Rocha [1] has a unique talent for using her designs to represent the world of girlhood with authority and complexity. For her brand's autumn/winter 2021 collection at London Fashion Week [2], Simone chose layers of satin, leather, and tulle to create a sartorial love letter to the "fragile rebels" of 2021.

Standout trends for Simone Rocha's autumn/winter 2021 collection are the brand's signature tulle and puff sleeves, which are reimagined by contrasting the fragility of tulle skirts [3] and dresses with the rebelliousness of leather jackets, puff sleeves, and combat boots. Poised for back-to-school, there is a prep-school theme to the collection as seen in the flat-collar white Oxford shirts layered under sheer pinafore dresses — we're thinking hints of Gossip Girl [4]. The collection also nods to the romance of winter roses, floral embroidery, and Bridgeton [5]-inspired details while also referencing fashion's patchwork trend [6] with deconstructed designs inspired by wallpaper prints and stained-glass windows.

In an ode to the brand's "fragile rebels", Simone Rocha shared the inspiration behind the autumn 2021 collection with the following poem:

The Winter Roses.
Clarity and identity,
Precise, stronger, signature.

Thinking of clothes in a protective and practical way, fragile rebels.

Lost and found, interior wallpaper prints gaining a sense of place but patched-worked together to
disorientate.

Structured, sculpted leather,
Harnessing and resisting, creeping flower.

Uniformity & naivety.
Lunch boxes, school bag,
Order and education.

Embroidered tulles, Hand-painted flowers on pearls.
Porcelain cameos, encased in gold.

The Three Graces.
Satin, leather, tulle.