Across the pond

When it came to conceiving his inaugural presentation for Smythson, creative director Luc Goidadin dived in head first. The designer’s ambitious show set was inspired by eccentric English country homes, and featured a festoon of topsy turvy objects, from dining room tables to tiny yachts, classical sculptures, to garden furniture, appearing to sink into a lily pad-strewn pond. ‘We wanted to nod to the British heritage of the brand via a historical setting’ Goidadin explains, ‘...which also complemented the modernity of the new collection’. The presentation was held inside Somerset House’s Portico Rooms, and as part of the presentation the creative director was inspired by photographs of Lord Berners surrounded by his painted doves at Farringdon House or the famed parties at Ashcombe House. ‘These homes were really theatres in which fantasies were enacted he adds.’ This presentation was pretty dreamlike too.