LONDON — September will be a big month for Russell & Bromley, which will unveil the debut collection of its first creative director Daniel Beardsworth-Shaw — part of a wider brand reveal for the British footwear and accessories retailer founded in 1873.

Russell & Bromley began acting on its five-year transformation plan last year, hiring Beardsworth-Shaw, moving its headquarters from the south London suburbs to Kingly Street in Soho and sharpening the identity of the brand.

“We’ve always been quite quiet. We don’t shout about ourselves,” said chief executive officer Andrew Bromley in an interview. “Now, we want to connect more — with our partners, with our customers. We’ve always been British. Now we want to be confidently British.”

He added that the company has also moved away from a product-first approach to focus more on the brand. The executive said the company wants to make it “very clear to our customers who we are, what we stand for and staying true to that identity.”

To that end, the company hired Beardsworth-Shaw, a former design director for the British high street brand Accessorize, to take charge of the collections. Beardsworth-Shaw said his goal is to bring Russell & Bromley “back to British fashion.”

For his debut fall 2025 collection, Beardsworth-Shaw delved into the 145-year-old archive and used three British cultural moments — punk, club kids and mods — as inspiration.

He said the rebelliousness of those moments captures the brand’s history and identity. “We’ve always been on our own path, and an anomaly in the marketplace,” he said.

Beardsworth-Shaw also used the brand’s Chester loafer — a bestseller for more than 60 years — as a stylistic cornerstone of the new collection.

The loafer’s signature details, from box stitching to the fringe and tassel, informed the design of many of this season’s silhouettes.

The new collection also features a full party-wear range, including flat shoes and statement loafers as well as colourful heels. For day there are cow print clogs, tartan-patterned slingbacks and a variety of boots.

The brand plans to mark the launch with a campaign that features a famous face, the first time they’ve gone that route since the 1990s. The brand declined to say who that famous face would be.

On the operational side, the business is also taking decisive steps to manage costs and become more agile.

Revenue in the year ending Dec. 31, 2024, fell 9 percent to 56.5 million pounds, with an operating loss of 9 million pounds. The company said a challenging economic environment coupled with a major investment in the five-year strategy was largely to blame.

The move to the new Soho headquarters, and the consolidation of everyone under one roof, may have been expensive, but it was an important step for the brand, according to Bromley.

“The old office was much more of a back-of-house setup — accounting, finance, payroll,” he said. “Now, we’ve brought in more customer-facing and market-facing digital talent. And having those people together, under one roof, has made a big difference.”

He added: “I think we really needed to incorporate more tech, which will always drive efficiency once it lands,” Bromley said. “But it also allows a digital connection with customers. The build around customer data was essential.”

Although those tech investments impacted short-term profits, Bromley said the company is now a leaner, more effective machine. “We assessed the talent and skills we needed to deliver our vision. That led to restructuring — new roles and new capabilities. We mapped out the ideal setup and reshaped the organization to meet that.”

Beardsworth-Shaw said being in Soho helps with the team’s creative flow. “It just keeps us immersed in it all. We’re a stone’s throw from so many culturally relevant things. We’re also closer to our stores so we can easily run into one and observe customer behaviors and shopping habits.”

Bromley said all of the changes have created a new energy within the group.

“There’s enthusiasm not just for the product, but for the brand, for the conversations people are having, the events we’re doing, and how and where we’re showing up,” he said, adding that he’s excited to have a new creative lead in-house, too.

“I think creativity has been something that’s been very inherent to the brand ever since Day One. We just haven’t always had it in-house. Now we do. That’s what excites me: creating a love of the product throughout the whole building,” he said.