You know a brand has reached official “It” status when fashion editors, influencers and stylists start spending their own money actually shopping, rather than simply accepting whatever is offered for free. Such is the case with Chanel, where designer Matthieu Blazy’s first ready-to-wear collection arrived in Paris stores just before his second arrived on the catwalk.
Cue consumer hysteria as insiders of all ages raced from the Chanel flagship on Rue Cambon to the stores on Avenue Montaigne to the Bon Marché emporium in search of their desired item, frantically texting one another about sizes and stock and overwhelming the sales people.
Shoes were the get of choice; especially the black squared-off spectator pump with a mint green toe, and a burgundy peep-toe style. Or so it seemed, judging by the array of new purchases on display at the brand’s show at the Grand Palais mere days — or in some cases, hours — later. One front-row denizen kept stretching out her legs to admire her New Chanel-clad feet in satisfaction.
Chanel clients have always pulled out their logo finery for the défilé, peacocking in double Cs like a flock of tweed-and-pearl-bedecked fashion fowl, but this is the first time I can remember so many editors doing the same.
So what exactly is it about Mr. Blazy’s work that is making everyone so obsessed?
Consider his new collection.
It began with Stephanie Cavalli, the 50-year-old Caribbean Italian model, in a ribbed black skirt that zipped up the side and a matching collarless jacket with bright gold buttons: clearly Chanel in color and line; contemporary in material and trim; ageless in its application. And so it went.
Squared-off classic Chanel jackets mixed it up with new Chanel-ish jackets in the form of shackets and bombers. The famous Chanel dropped waist — the one that freed women from the corset — was dropped even farther, to around the top of the thigh. Flapper dresses were collaged together in iridescent amalgamations of lace, shimmer and shine.
The bouclé tweed that is a signature of the house was reinvented: rubberized in Jackson Pollock paint flicks (in a preview, Mr. Blazy called it “action tweed”); eroded to reveal the black lining within; knit with tiny mother-of-pearl beads; screen-printed on silk and glinting chain mail like trompe l’oeil; layered over relaxed shirting that was always left untucked. The treatments were eye-popping (some, Mr. Blazy said, had taken a year to perfect), but the effect was easy.
And yes, there were more shoes: curvy mules that looked as if the first collection’s spectators and peep-toe styles had gotten together to make a baby. Get yourself on the wait-list now.
Everything on the runway was identifiably Chanel, though not obviously so. Mr. Blazy’s references are to Coco Chanel’s more obscure decades — the 1920s, the ’60s — rather than her most famous, giving a touch of if-you-know-you-know to his work even though everyone also knows. That’s a fine line to walk, and it’s part of what makes New Chanel so appealing. Mr. Blazy plays on the establishment nature of the brand — some of his suits verge on the grandmotherly — just as he plays with it.
Even the set, filled with primary-color construction cranes to suggest building (because, you know, he’s building a new future for the house) and a glimmering floor (intended to recall the Impressionists), was very Meccano-meets-Monet.
If Mr. Blazy’s celebrated predecessor, Karl Lagerfeld, created the template for taking a stodgy heritage brand and infusing it with a heavy dose of irony and kitsch to give it a contemporary kick, Mr. Blazy has learned the lesson but lost the cynicism. Instead, he infuses his work with a sense of discovery and enchantment that seems like the start of something new.
In the preview, Mr. Blazy had described Chanel herself as representing “both function and fiction,” meaning she created clothes, especially daywear, for the specific purpose of liberating women to go about their business while also being engaged with dress as a tool of seduction. Not to mention self-creation.
It’s a phrase that could be equally applied to his clothes. The result is like an all-inclusive game of dress-up, seamed with delight. Who wouldn’t want to join — or buy — in?
Vanessa Friedman has been the fashion director and chief fashion critic for The Times since 2014.
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