MARKS & SPENCER JUST MADE ITS LONDON FASHION WEEK DEBUT - AND YOU CAN BUY THE COLLECTION TODAY

Marks & Spencer made its first-ever appearance on the official London Fashion Week calendar this season, timing the debut to coincide with the retailer's centenary year in fashion.

Building the entire presentation around a "see now, buy now" format - meaning the co-ed womenswear and menswear collection became available to purchase online and in UK stores immediately following the show, rather than the usual six-to-eight-month gap between runway and retail.

"At M&S we focus on designing clothes with style, quality and value, and making fashion accessible to all," said CEO Stuart Machin, adding that customers could shop the collection "online or from M&S stores across the UK" without delay. The show was also streamed publicly, extending the presentation well beyond London Fashion Week's traditionally industry-only audience of press and buyers.

The inclusion of a genuinely mass-market retailer on the same official schedule as Alexander McQueen and Mulberry represents a deliberate BFC strategy this season to connect runway spectacle more directly to what ordinary shoppers can actually buy - a format experiment that stands in sharp contrast to the months-long production and manufacturing lead time most luxury and designer collections require between a runway show and store arrival.

For M&S, a hundred-year history in fashion retail without any prior fashion-week presence, a debut built specifically around immediate purchasability - rather than aspirational runway spectacle disconnected from what's actually for sale - fits squarely within the brand's core identity as a retailer built on accessibility rather than exclusivity, even while sharing a calendar with houses built on precisely the opposite premise.