British jackets carry military service records into civilian wardrobes, the duffle and the Harrington among them. Baracuta still cuts the Harrington jacket in Manchester. Manchester-made outerwear under the Twin Track name comes from Private White V.C.. Gloverall keeps the duffle coat tradition, from the WWII Monty to the officer cut. Waxed cotton and wool melton split the list by cloth weight. British blocks assume you layer, so fit the shoulder over a sweater.
Housed in what it calls the oldest house in Bath, with a cellar exposing 12th-to-14th-century monastery remains, Sally Lunn's still bakes its trencher-style Sally Lunn Bun to a closely guarded 1680s recipe, with a kitchen museum for diners.
Best for Housed in one of the oldest buildings in Bath
Sally Lunn's occupies one of the oldest houses in Bath, a building whose cellar has yielded seven excavated floor levels spanning the 12th to 14th centuries, including foundation walls from a medieval monastery kitchen and refectory. The house's own kitchen and bakery date to 1622, built around a bread oven believed to go back to around 1100. It is this kitchen, along with the archaeological finds beneath it, that forms the small museum downstairs, free to visit for anyone eating upstairs in what the house calls its 'living museum.'
The signature item is the Sally Lunn Bun, a large trencher-style brioche said to have been brought to Bath around 1680 by Solange Luyon, a Huguenot refugee whose name anglicised to Sally Lunn. The recipe has been kept a closely guarded secret ever since, traditionally passed down with the lease of the building rather than published, and the bun is still served today, split, toasted, and topped sweet or savoury, as the anchor of a menu that runs from breakfast through dinner. Afternoon tea includes a Jane Austen-themed sitting, a nod to the writer's own time in Bath. Between the bun's unbroken run since the 17th century and the medieval brickwork visible in the cellar, the building does double duty as both a working eating house and one of the city's oldest surviving structures.
A vintage clothing shop in Kings Court, the courtyard off King Street near the Trongate, stocked with garments from the 1960s through the 1980s. Rails hold jackets, dresses, footwear and accessories alongside period Levi's, Converse and Dr Martens.
British fashion brand operating since 1994, with a vintage-inspired, rock-leaning aesthetic spanning leather jackets, distressed knitwear and a muted palette.
British outerwear house founded 1851 by John Emary in London, credited with early rain-repellent wool and trench-coat development; held royal warrants from 1897 and reportedly dressed Winston Churchill and Margaret Thatcher.
Best for Weatherproof outerwear; Club check pattern
Aquascutum was founded in London in 1851 by John Emary; the name combines the Latin aqua (water) and scutum (shield). The company is credited with early rain-repellent woollen cloth, the raglan sleeve, and development of the trench coat, which it supplied to British officers during both World Wars. It received royal warrants across several reigns, starting in 1897, and its coats are reported to have been worn by figures including Winston Churchill and Margaret Thatcher. The brand has since changed hands multiple times and now operates partly through licensing arrangements.
Label founded in 2021 by Zied Ben Amor and Jean-Marc Fellous, making jackets and shirting from deadstock fabric hand-embroidered and dyed by artisan collectives in India, including a capsule collaboration with Sezane.
Best for Artisanal shirts
Baziszt was founded in 2021 out of a collaboration between Zied Ben Amor, a Tunisian-born creative, and Jean-Marc Fellous, a Paris-based fashion figure. The label's positioning centers on reworking deadstock fabrics sourced from markets around the world, which are then hand-embroidered and hand-dyed by artisans in India - the brand describes this as an effort to revive traditional dyeing and embroidery techniques while creating steady work for collectives of dyers and embroiderers in remote Indian villages. Its jacket range combines that hand-finished decoration with more tailored, structured cuts, and the brand also produces shirting under the same craft-and-deadstock model. Baziszt has done at least one visible collaboration with the French label Sezane, and its pieces are stocked by multi-brand retailers including Farfetch and Fashion Clinic.
Founded in Walthamstow in 2016, Blackhorse Lane Ateliers makes selvedge and organic-denim jeans in its own East London factory alongside chore jackets, shirts and related ready-to-wear. Shoppers can try the jeans at Coal Drops Yard, Soho or the Walthamstow factory outlet, and Blackhorse Lane offers free lifetime repairs on its own denim garments.
The trench itself — Thomas Burberry’s gabardine since 1856, the check, and the flagship house of British luxury. Past-season trench and check pieces reach The Mall outlet at Leccio Reggello, outside Florence.
Best for The trench coat and check heritage, done properly.
Thomas Burberry founded his outfitter's business in Basingstoke in 1856 and changed outerwear permanently with gabardine — the tightly woven, weatherproof cotton he developed and patented, which clothed polar expeditions and, in the First World War, produced the trench coat whose name records its origin. The trench remains the house's central object: the check lining, the D-rings, the storm flap all descend from function. A century and a half on, Burberry is Britain's largest luxury house by revenue, cycling through creative directors while the coat holds steady at the center. The heritage trenches — Kensington, Chelsea, Waterloo cuts — are made in England and worth buying over fashion pieces; they outlast trends by design. The check, over-exposed in the 1990s and carefully rehabilitated since, is best worn where it began: inside the coat.
Have a heritage trench altered rather than sized up — the coat is cut to layer over tailoring, and a proper sleeve length transforms how it reads.
Drake’s still makes its ties by hand at a dedicated East London factory, using constructions from ancient madder to knitted silk. The shops extend that haberdashery approach into shirts, jackets, knitwear and accessories.
British luxury house since 1893 — part of Richemont. Alfred Dunhill's motoring coat to contemporary menswear, leather goods and accessories.
Best for British heritage luxury menswear
Alfred Dunhill inherited his father's saddlery in 1893 and pivoted it toward the horseless carriage with a phrase that still defines the house: "everything for the car but the motor." Motorities — driving coats, goggles, dashboard clocks, the audacious Bobby Finder — made Dunhill the outfitter of Edwardian speed; the pipes and lighters that followed (the Unique lighter could be struck one-handed at the wheel) made it a gentleman's-luxury empire from Jermyn Street to Shanghai by the 1920s.
The modern house, part of Richemont, distilled all of it into contemporary menswear: leather goods machined with automotive precision, the Lock bag's engine-turned clasp, tailoring and knitwear that dress British quietness for a global customer. Bourdon House in Mayfair — the Duke of Westminster's former residence — serves as the London home, complete with barber and cellar.
The heritage is genuinely eccentric and the register genuinely calm: a century of gadgets resolved into understatement, with the long A-D logo as the signature.
Freda and Harold Morris founded Gloverall in 1951 selling surplus WWII Naval duffle coats from a Holborn warehouse; when military stock ran out around 1953 they began manufacturing their own, including the Monty, named for Field Marshal Montgomery.
Best for Duffle coats, Monty; WWII duffle coat; Officer duffle
Gloverall's origin is tied directly to military surplus. Freda and Harold Morris started the business in 1951 after the Ministry of Defence offered them a large excess of unused WWII Royal Navy duffle coats, which they sold from a Holborn warehouse in London. Demand outstripped the surplus, and by around 1953, with stocks depleted, Gloverall began producing its own versions of the coat. The best-known result is the Monty, named after Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, which became the brand's signature design. Men's duffle coats in the Heritage range, including the Original Monty, continue to be made in England at a Gloverall factory outside London.
The inspiration for Kingsman — the single-button jacket, the equestrian heritage, and the Savile Row house that dressed Gregory Peck and the Duke of Windsor.
Best for Single-button jacket, Kingsman inspiration, and the most cinematic tailor on the Row.
British fashion retailer founded in 1970 by John Robinson, who opened Jigsaw's first shop in Brighton after a sheepskin coat he brought back from Turkey drew attention; a second store followed in Hampstead in 1972.
Best for Contemporary, Timeless
Jigsaw was founded in 1970 by John Robinson, who opened the brand's first shop in Brighton after a sheepskin coat he had brought back from a trip to Turkey drew an enthusiastic response from people who saw him wearing it. That reaction convinced him there was room for a British label built around durable, considered pieces rather than fast-moving trends. A second store followed in Hampstead, London, in 1972. Robinson's design sensibility was shaped by trips to Japan and by the work of Yohji Yamamoto, Comme des Garçons and Issey Miyake, whose ideas about cut and construction he combined with a more eccentric British sensibility. The approach brought Jigsaw industry recognition, including the British Fashion Council's Contemporary Design of the Year award in 1989. The brand expanded into menswear in 1994 and launched Jigsaw Junior, initially a girlswear line, in 1996 — building out from its original womenswear base into a fuller family label while keeping its emphasis on quality cloth and considered design.
John Simons opened the Ivy Shop in Richmond in 1964 and first labelled the Baracuta G9 a Harrington jacket in 1965. The shop moved to 46 Chiltern Street in Marylebone in 2011 and sells its own collections alongside Baracuta and Paraboot, with Jamieson's of Shetland. Vintage pieces sit with the new stock, as they did at the Covent Garden shop from 1982.
Best for Ivy League menswear, Harrington jackets and Baracuta G9s from the man who named them
John Simons began in 1955 as a window dresser for Cecil Gee, then a prominent name in British menswear. After selling from a market stall in Hackney he opened Clothesville on Mare Street in 1963, a shop that dressed the mod scene. The Ivy Shop followed in Richmond in the summer of 1964. In 1965 Simons recognised the Baracuta G9 as the jacket worn by the character Rodney Harrington, and his shop's label became the first documented use of the term Harrington jacket. The Squire Shop opened on King's Road in 1967 with co-founder Stuart Malloy, and in 1982 J. Simons opened on Russell Street in Covent Garden, early in its approach to selling vintage goods. The storefront moved to No. 46 Chiltern Street in Marylebone in 2011. The rails today mix the house's own collections with Baracuta and J. Press, with G.H. Bass and Paraboot and Jamieson's of Shetland alongside. The shop presents itself as the reference for Ivy League style in Britain, filtered through a mid-century American and European eye, and vintage pieces still hang beside the new stock.
Carnaby Street mod label founded by Javid Alavi in 1967, trading name registered 15 September 1967; grew from a Kingly Market stall into a global Harrington-jacket brand.
Best for Mod clothing, retro; Harrington, mod; Mod Clothing; Sta-press trousers
Merc was founded by Javid Alavi in London in 1967; the Merc trading name has been in continuous use since 15 September 1967. The business began trading from Kingly Market and Carnaby Court, with the Merc name initially displayed only inside the shop, before it expanded into a full shop on Carnaby Street. In its early years the shop also stocked other brands, including Fred Perry, Farah and Lonsdale, before later dropping outside labels to sell exclusively its own Merc-branded merchandise. Though the brand's roots are in mod and skinhead style - it became closely associated with Harrington jackets and target-motif polo shirts through the 1970s and 1980s revivalist scenes - Merc has since broadened into a worldwide retail and wholesale business.
Percival makes contemporary menswear in small runs, balancing knitwear, shirting and outerwear with playful embroidery. Its collaborations and seasonal motifs add character without turning the whole wardrobe into novelty clothing.
British menswear brand founded 1975—contemporary tailored clothing in knitwear, outerwear, shirting, blazers, footwear, and accessories with sharp working-class styling.
Best for Mod tailoring
Peter Werth founded his London menswear label in 1975 in Islington, north London. The brand's early inspiration drew from sharper, more formal styling traditions rooted in working-class 1970s culture. Collections evolved from contemporary knitwear through outerwear, shirting, blazers, and fine jerseywear into shoes and accessories—building a comprehensive wardrobe. The brand emphasizes 'high quality British contemporary menswear' with classic wardrobe essentials and seasonal collections. Product categories span long and short-sleeved shirts, polo shirts and t-shirts, knitwear (sweatshirts and jumpers), coats and jackets, footwear (formal shoes, casual shoes, boots, loafers, brogues, sandals), and accessories (bags, wallets, belts, hats, scarves, gloves). Peter Werth navigated significant challenges during the 2008 financial crisis, entering administration in 2011 and placing 70 jobs at risk before JD Sports acquired the brand, intellectual property, and stock. The acquisition saved 68 jobs at Peter Werth concessions. The brand relaunched with fresh direction and new website presence in October 2019, re-establishing itself after a period of market absence. The brand continues to offer flexible payment methods and regular sales alongside core collections.
Rivet & Hide sells Japanese selvedge denim and heritage menswear from 11-12 Old Burlington Street in Mayfair, where it moved in December 2024. A Manchester store trades at 59 Thomas Street. Founded in 2012 as a by-appointment service, it stocks small-batch jeans from makers such as Iron Heart and Pure Blue Japan alongside leather jackets and bench-made boots. Jewellery and a vintage hemming service round out the offer.
Best for Japanese selvedge denim with expert fittings and hemming in Mayfair and Manchester
Rivet & Hide began in 2012 as a by-appointment service built around Japanese selvedge denim. The company behind it was incorporated in London on 15 November 2011. It opened a London shop in 2014 and added a Manchester store at 59 Thomas Street in the Northern Quarter in 2019. In December 2024 it moved its London flagship from Fitzrovia to 11-12 Old Burlington Street in Mayfair, a short walk from Savile Row and three times the size of the old shop. The stock-in-trade is small-batch jeans and jackets from Japanese mills and makers, among them Iron Heart and Pure Blue Japan, Momotaro Jeans and Studio D'Artisan. Around the denim sit made-to-order leather jackets and flannel shirts, together with bench-made boots from Viberg and Tricker's. Knitwear comes from Dehen 1920 and hand-cast jewellery from Good Art Hlywd. Much of what it sells is strictly small run. The shop favours brands that build modern styles with old-school construction. Both stores offer a vintage hemming service. The shop describes its style of service as unhurried and knowledgeable rather than a hard sell.
British menswear brand founded by Liam Gallagher in 2009, built around mod-inspired parkas, paisley, knitwear and shirting; the label continues today under later ownership.
Best for Mod style, British; Paisley mod prints; Quilted jacket
British outdoor-clothing brand founded in 1974 above a launderette in Chorlton, Greater Manchester, by sailors-turned-climbers John Hunt and Simon Wright, making waterproof cagoules; launched its first Gore-Tex jacket in 1982. HQ remains near Manchester's edge, close to the Peak District.
Best for Waterproof, hiking
Sprayway started in 1974 above a laundrette in Chorlton, Greater Manchester, when John Hunt and Simon Wright - competitive dinghy sailors who were also keen mountaineers - began making functional, affordably priced PU-coated nylon cagoules for the sailing market. The brand launched its first Gore-Tex jacket in 1982 and, a year later, became the first to machine-tape non-Gore-Tex waterproof garments, under its own Hydro-Dry range. Its Torridon Gore-Tex jacket became a near-ubiquitous sight on UK hillwalks through the 1990s. Sprayway's headquarters sits on the eastern edge of Manchester, close enough to see the foothills of the Peak District from its windows.
Barbour began in 1894 when John Barbour started supplying oilskins from the Market Place in South Shields. The family firm, now in its fifth generation, still makes the Bedale and Beaufort wax jackets by hand at its Simonside factory in the same town. It holds Royal Warrants and re-waxes and repairs jackets through its Wax for Life service. The wardrobe now extends from outerwear to knitwear and footwear, with a line for dogs.
Best for Bedale, Beaufort and waxed cotton jackets
John Barbour, a Scot, set up in the Market Place in South Shields in 1894. He supplied oilskins to sailors and fishermen in the North East of England. His son Malcolm produced the first mail order catalogue in 1908. By 1917 it accounted for almost three quarters of the business, with orders from Chile and Hong Kong. Duncan Barbour, a motorcyclist of the third generation, introduced the one-piece International suit in 1936, named for the International Six Day Trials. A two-piece version called the Ursula became standard issue in the submarine service from 1940. Margaret Barbour became Chairman in 1973 after her husband's death. She designed the Bedale, a lightweight thornproof jacket for riding, and followed it with the Beaufort in 1983. The company holds Royal Warrants, the first from the Duke of Edinburgh. It moved into its Simonside factory in South Shields, where the Bedale and Beaufort are still made by hand. The same building houses the Wax for Life service, where jackets are re-waxed and repaired. That practice was first listed in the 1921 catalogue. Barbour International became a stand-alone brand in 2013. The family firm is now in its fifth generation and sells in over 55 countries around the world.
Ben Wyvis Kilts has made Highland wear on Church Street since 1990, with every kilt hand sewn from start to finish by makers who sign and date their own work. The shop offers made-to-measure kilts across thousands of tartans alongside ready-to-wear pieces, jackets, sporrans and wedding hire.
Best for Hand-sewn, made-to-measure kilts and Highland wear
A registered charity gallery and shop inside the Bluecoat arts centre, it represents around 250 British craftspeople working in ceramics, jewellery, textiles and glass. The centre pairs a retail shop with rotating exhibitions and maker talks, channelling proceeds back into supporting craft practice rather than shareholder profit.
Best for Contemporary British craft, ceramics and jewellery
Gresham Blake is a bespoke and ready-to-wear tailor founded in Brighton in 2002, cutting suits and jackets in boldly patterned British cloth from its Bond Street shop. The house also runs a Soho outpost and produces its own shirting and accessories.
A British menswear brand founded in 1997, licensing the name of the Lambretta scooter (built by Innocenti in Milan, 1947–1972) to produce polos, Harrington jackets and casualwear rooted in 1960s Mod style rather than the scooters themselves.
Best for Mod clothing, scooter
Lambretta Clothing was established in 1997 as a British apparel brand built around licensing the name and badge of the Lambretta scooter — the Italian machine that Ferdinando Innocenti's Milan steel-tubing firm began producing in 1947 as affordable postwar transport, and which, alongside Vespa, became closely identified with Britain's 1960s Mod subculture before Innocenti's scooter production ended in the early 1970s. The clothing label has no manufacturing connection to the original scooter company; it is a separate menswear business that uses the Lambretta name and target-and-scooter imagery to sell polo shirts, Harrington jackets, bomber jackets and graphic tees aimed at Mod-revival and terrace-casual customers. Its designs draw directly from mid-1960s British youth style — the era when Mod scooter riders adopted a specific uniform of tailored, clean-lined casualwear — reissued as present-day ready-to-wear rather than vintage reproduction.
Marshall Artist is a British menswear label that has traded for almost two decades. The range centres on outerwear, with jackets, coats, overshirts, hoodies, polo shirts, denim, knitwear. Collections run under the names Siren, Marchio, Stampa and Active, and a separate Outdoor Tailoring line covers quarter zips and track tops. The label ships within the United Kingdom and abroad.
Best for British menswear outerwear and the Outdoor Tailoring line.
Marshall Artist emerged from East London in 2001, founded by fashion designer Neil McLaren in collaboration with Paul, who previously worked at Hardy Blechman's influential Maharishi label. The brand synthesizes high-quality contemporary menswear with streetwear aesthetics, combining functional design and distinctive detailing. Marshall Artist initially gained prominence through innovative outerwear—jackets and over-shirts featuring unconventional dyeing techniques—while blending terrace-wear silhouettes with refined tailoring. The brand's philosophy centers on innovation and craftsmanship, merging classic styles with modern aesthetics. Marshall Artist has attracted high-profile wearers across sports and music, including David Beckham, Kasabian, and Kendrick Lamar. The label remains a significant player in UK menswear, known for bold styling and its approach to casual wear that respects heritage while embracing contemporary edge.
Founded in 1971 and long a proving ground for Liverpool's post-punk and indie scenes, Probe Records now trades from a unit inside the Bluecoat arts centre in the city centre. It stocks new and secondhand vinyl across genres and remains a fixture of the city's music heritage, having outlasted several changes of address over five decades.
Best for Vinyl records and Liverpool music heritage
A Highland outfitter on St Vincent Street selling and hiring kilts, tartan trews and jackets, with made-to-order tartan trousers cut in Glasgow. The firm designs its own graphic tartan and Scottish-themed clothing alongside traditional wedding and formal wear.
Tracing its line back to around 1720, Stewart Christie & Co on Queen Street is a Scottish bespoke tailor, hand-cutting and finishing suits, jackets and Highland dress. Alongside bespoke and made-to-measure work it stocks tartans, tweeds and ready-to-wear for men and women.
Nottingham workwear label founded in 2008 by David Keyte and Stephanie Porritt from a kitchen table, drawing on Keyte's Midlands working-class background and prior experience at Paul Smith and Maharishi; British and Japanese-sourced fabrics cut into utilitarian menswear.
Best for Workwear polos, British; British workwear, thoughtful; Workwear Jacket
Universal Works was founded in Nottingham in 2008 by David Keyte and Stephanie Porritt, launching its first collection in 2009 while Keyte worked from his own kitchen table. Keyte had previously worked at Paul Smith and Maharishi, and drew the brand's founding inspiration from the utilitarian workwear that surrounded his upbringing in a working-class 1970s Midlands town. The label's identity centres on functional, workwear-influenced menswear made using a mix of British fabrics and mills, alongside sourcing that has included manufacturing in Portugal and England. Universal Works has since grown into an internationally stocked independent brand, retaining Keyte as co-founder and designer, while continuing to operate out of Nottingham.
Great Yarmouth workwear maker, incorporated 1898 as Johnson and Sons before forming Yarmouth Stores Ltd. Once supplied Scottish herring-fishing crews with oilskin smocks and aprons; today a family firm with about 20 machinists making natural-fibre smocks.
Best for Smocks & work jackets
The firm's recorded history begins on 1 February 1898, when Johnson and Sons became a limited company in Great Yarmouth. Three days later, four of its partners joined other local businessmen to found Yarmouth Stores Ltd, set up to trade as outfitters, clothiers, hosiers and sellers of waterproof clothing, oils and drapery. The company relabeled its waterproof lines under the Yarmouth Stores name and built an export trade in oilskins, knitwear and workwear that reached markets abroad.
Before the Second World War the firm employed more than 1,200 people, most of them machinists in Great Yarmouth factories sewing overalls, uniforms, smocks and other workwear. During the herring-fishing industry's peak, the company was a major supplier to Scottish fishing crews and the women who processed the catch, providing oilskin skirts, aprons and boots suited to gutting and packing work on the quaysides. When the herring industry declined between the 1930s and 1950s, the firm lost a core part of its market and some retail branches closed.
The 1960s brought a new customer base after gas was discovered off the Norfolk coast: the company began supplying vessels and crews working the gas fields with chandlery, equipment and protective clothing, a service line that continues today. The business remains family-owned, still making its smocks and oilskins in Great Yarmouth with a factory of around 20 machinists working in natural fibres to original historic patterns.
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗
Visit official site ↗