Womenswear Hit or Miss

With spring 08 ranges now in full swing on the high street, it's time to find out how the UK's mainstream retailers are tackling the season's key fashion trends.

Each season, Drapers hits the shops to see how the main multiples fare in terms of key looks, product mix, environment and value for money, with each retailer given an overall score out of 40 to reflect its performance. First up this season is womenswear, with mainstream, contemporary and young fashion stores put under the microscope.

This season we turn the spotlight on London's West End, which houses the flagship stores of some of the UK's biggest retail players, offering an insight into the best of the best on the high street.

The stores around Regent Street and Oxford Street offered a predictably trend-aware set of collections for Drapers to analyse. Key looks were omnipresent, with floral dresses, ruffled and bibbed blouses, and nautical stripes featuring in almost all of the womenswear presentations. Retailers were also backing new silhouettes, with flared jeans and high-waisted A-line skirts proving popular. Volume was still present on embellished smock tops, but the capacious dress shapes so prevalent last spring have been replaced by 1950s prom styles, and more demure tea dresses.

Many retailers favoured leather or linen options for summer outerwear, in shades of mushroom and grey, while the most commercial catwalk-inspired trend was the star print.

The quality versus cost issue rages on at Primark, but loose threads and wafer-thin fabrics didn't seem to deter punters – its impressive windows and bargain prices made it the busiest store Drapers visited.

In total we mystery-shopped 24 leading womenswear players to see which ones made the grade for spring 08. Check out Drapers next week for our menswear analysis, with footwear coming up in the April 26 issue. Click on the three section headings below to find out how the stores we visited fared.