The Making Of The Homecoming Collection

Creating Homecoming

By Billy Brayshaw.

Speaking to Olivia Prince and Davina Hewitt –- The Creative Director & The Chief Designer here at Murci about the latest collection, Homecoming.

If you didn’t know this already, Murci was born in the summer of 2019, having been relaunched and rebranded. Since this time, it’s grown into one of Manchester’s most exciting fashion labels, with customers across the globe.

For me personally, it’s been an exciting few weeks’ settling into my role as Head of Marketing here at Murci. With the launch of the Homecoming Collection being all consuming, it has been a pleasure to sit down and chat with Olivia & Davina in more detail about the Murci brand & the new collection.

What makes the HomeComing collection different to other collections you’ve created?

It’s the first time we have fully designed a collection in house on this scale. It’s our first complete collection. Also, since the beginning of Murci, it’s been super important for us that we represent women of every size, and finally sizes 6-16, which we are super proud of. We hope to expand more on this for future collections, adding plus size, maternity, tall etc.

What was your biggest inspiration behind the collection?

We love the 90’s. The rebirth of that fashion era is in full swing, so we touched on that a little, but as always with a Murci twist. We also realised on the release of our summer collection that the bold prints and unique styles worked the best. Our customers loved the clothes that you couldn’t find anywhere else, so we wanted to carry that through to the Homecoming collection. We chose to keep the bright colours that worked well and have become a key part of the Murci brand, which makes us, and our customers stand out.

What are your favourite pieces from the collection?

Davina: The key-hole brown trouser set. I love the colours and the print. It was one of the prints that we designed last minute, and it felt like it brought the whole collection together. It instantly worked from the get-go.

Can you tell us more about the process of building the collection?

As fun as it’s been putting the collection together, it was also quite challenging. We ended up being behind schedule! Throughout the pandemic it’s obviously been difficult to visit suppliers, so a lot of our communication has been based online which has slowed us down, especially when we had to wait to receive samples of the clothes and then request the adjustments to get the design perfect. Although it was tough at times, it was worth it. We are so happy with how the collection has come together.

Any styling tips?

We always try to create pieces that need minimal thought to the styling. They are bold pieces and stand out on their own. As a general tip, looking at the full range, we would opt for some subtle jewellery, and a nude shoe. We worked hard to make sure everything worked together so our customers didn’t have to.

What’s the most important thing to you when putting a collection together?

We always approach our designs with the aim of making the wearer feel good, confident and empowered. All the collections we create are unique and we want our wearers to feel unique whilst dressed in them.

Finally, what’s next for Murci, any news on the next campaign?

We have some amazing ideas already and will be sharing them soon, watch this space!