Chanel puts on the Ritz and glamour
French fashion label pays tribute to its founder and craftsmen at Paris fashion show
PARIS: Legendary French fashion label Chanel paid homage to its founder Coco Chanel on Tuesday during its 13th Metiers d'Art show at the Ritz hotel in Paris.
With pillbox hats and its netted veils, long woolly jumpers and scarves, and tweed suits glittering with gorgeous inlay, one half-expected Mademoiselle Chanel herself to appear for afternoon tea with one of her aristocratic lovers.
The redoubtable designer spent a large part of her life living in a suite in the swish hotel, including - most controversially - during World War II, when a German intelligence officer, Baron Hans Gunther von Dincklage, shared her bed.
But current designer Karl Lagerfeld preferred to concentrate on the happier and more frivolous times, reported AFP.
Models rarely smile on the catwalk in Paris, but at the show, they positively beamed as they skipped between the tables of the Ritz's tearoom to the song Putting On The Ritz. They even occasionally fell into the arms of a beau in tails.
JET SET
Led by two models-turned-actresses, Cara Delevingne and Lily-Rose Depp - daughter of French actress Vanessa Paradis and Hollywood star Johnny Depp - it was a show about the insouciance of having it all; the indiscreet charm of the jet set writ large.
Singer Pharrell Williams wore pearls not just around his neck, but on top of his head too, and was more than happy about it. Meanwhile, Levi Dylan, grandson of singer and surprise Nobel laureate Bob Dylan, sported a tweed bomber jacket.
"The Ritz is very Paris, but men and women from all over the world come here, so it is a temple of cosmopolitan elegance," Lagerfeld told reporters afterwards.
The annual show, which celebrates the artistry of Chanel's small army of embroiderers, plumassiers and bootmakers, made a few knowing nods to street style with oversized beanie hats and pedal pushers. But otherwise, it was a time-machine trip through classic Chanel looks.
There was hardly a head not decorated with a plume, a fascinator hat or a camellia - Coco Chanel's favourite flower.
With eyes peering through net veils, and flared black leather trousers with black and white tweed, and leather jackets, it was the acme of 1930s elegance revisited.
"The Ritz is very Paris, but men and women from all over the world come here, so it is a temple of cosmopolitan elegance."
The Ritz is very Paris, but men and women from all over the world come here, so it is a temple of cosmopolitan elegance.Karl Lagerfeld
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