Venue and idea of the show
The show took place in 16th century castle Château de Chenonceaux also known as Le Château des Dames – The Women’s Castle because of all the famous women who lived there and been decorating and renovating it based on their taste and fashion of the time. Catherine de Medici, the widow of Henry II is the most famous woman who lived in this castle.
There was no physical audience on this show, apart from special guest – Kristen Stewart, who was gracefully watching the show from a brown wooden bench. The room that has been selected for the show felt quiet and mysterious.
Virginie Viard, the current Creative Director of Chanel (succeeding Karl Lagerfeld), prefers less complex shows, compared to her predecessor who has been impressing audiences by creating staged performance experiences.
The show was a tribute to craftsmanship, celebrating long lasting and continuously growing relationship of the brand with the many ateliers. Feather and artificial flower works, trellis of black ribbons laid over translucent organza and many more are the representation of the craftsmanship in traditions of the brand.
The looks
The collection is a great combination of a touch of gothics, renaissance, romantic and rock styles. It felt like there was a hint of magic as well in some attributes. Looks with lean and tall silhouettes with floor length skirts and coats and large hats gave this touch of magic along with a few of the coats resembling the magician cloaks.
Main colors of the show are black and white, many looks repeat a black and white checkered pattern of the floor of the hall.
Black and white check micro skirts were combined with gold jackets and shoes at the start of the show.
Leather elements, boots and bold black eye makeup was bringing the rock style, combined with romanticism of long dresses, layered pearls and light wavy hairstyle of the models.
White lycra leggings looked very refreshing combined with black short skirts, or total black looks.
There was some lace, organza and velvet throughout the show representing chic and elegant style of Chanel.
There were a few beautiful evening dresses towards the end. The show closed with great black strapless dress with a long back tail worn with a metallic belt and silver leggings.
Make-up and Hair
I found the models’ hair and make-up very curious. The stylists have used very light powder on the models, creating softly “baked looks” and very exaggerated black eye makeup, which created dolly expression. The hairstyles are very modern, not resembling with renaissance which dilutes the looks. Some of the short haircuts with bangs also framed the collection in similar way.
I hope the soft baked powder effect sticks around for a while. It looks very fresh on runways after many years of dominance of bronzy look.
Bags
This collection is displaying a great selection of Chanel bags with their most popular styles. We can see a few double-worn bags, micro bags worn in pair with large bags, beautiful micro bags on their own and even necklaces resembling micro bags.
Link to watch the show:
Photos by: Juergen Teller
No Comments