HBO
The HBO show’s season premiere has brought renewed interest in one of Burberry’s pieces.
Fashion has played a visible yet uncredited character in television shows for many years. Carrie Bradshaw and her friends navigated relationships, growth, and men in no less than her beloved Jimmy Choos in Sex and The City. Designer brands were being dropped left and right as Betty Suarez navigated her way through her job at the fictional fashion magazine Mode in Ugly Betty. Both iterations of Dynasty were known for their fashion as much as for their overt drama: the original series set trends for 80s glamor, while the Netflix remake featured so many designer pieces, it inspired a fan account dedicated to finding the exact items worn on each episode.
The latest among the list of shows is HBO’s Succession. The satirical dark comedy-drama, now on its fourth and final season, has been noted for featuring pieces that showcase understated elegance and sartorial workmanship. The show has given rise to quiet luxury as a trend in the last three seasons, but the show does not shy away from brand iconography as well. Case in point: Succession is trending because of the appearance of an easily recognizable pattern—Burberry’s vintage beige tartan check print.
In the scene from the show’s Sunday premiere that has now gone viral, Tom (played by Matthew Macfayden) is seen critiquing Greg’s (played by Nicholas Braun) date, Bridget (played by Francesca Root-Dodson) for bringing a “ludicrously capacious” and “gargantuan” bag to Logan Roy’s (played by Brian Cox) birthday party. The bag in question was a Burberry Title vintage check two-handle bag.
The Title bag, currently priced at USD2,890, first made its debut on the Fall/Winter 2019 runway, and is the first bag to feature Burberry’s then-new house code: the three-stud military closure.
Bridget wore the bag over a Sandro black and white floral short dress in embroidered fabric with a ruffled collar, puff sleeves and a frilly skirt, and ankle-high black boots. Bridget also used the bag’s crossbody sling to carry the tote over her shoulder. At the London premiere of the show, creator Jesse Armstrong revealed the bag choice was based on an interview they had with a wealthy New York woman asking about the “most offensive bag a woman could bring to something like this.”
Being the center of this humorous scene has done the brand good, as shown by the boosted interest in the tote. As of writing, Google Trends shows that worldwide searches for “burberry tote succession” in the past seven days have now increased 1,850 percent, with “burberry tote bag” and “succession burberry bag” being breakout searches. This is one instance where all publicity is good publicity.
