SuzyPFW: Chanel – Airport of Dreams
WHAT perfect timing! Not the departures and arrivals board at "Chanel Airlines", but the fact that Karl Lagerfeld had chosen an airport theme just as labour strife at Air France sent images around the world of its executives with clothes torn to shreds by angry workers.
1/12There could be no greater contrast than the strikes and delays of chaotic modern air travel with the Grand Palais in Paris, transformed into the airport of dreams: no queues for check-in, and where uniformed staff greeted model passengers dressed smartly in tailored clothes. Hunky pilots pushed their wheely bags, while the passengers followed the same route, in their flat silvered and transparent plastic boots.
2/12There were no double-C logos in the opening session, where airline "staff" wore colourful checked pants and skirt-suits that you have never seen on stewardesses in the aisle. They were followed by in-your-dreams travellers as sleek and chic as could be.
3/12"It's against sloppiness in travel; I do it like it should be - Chanel airlines is Private Jet for everyone," Karl said.
4/12"It's just the shape," he continued, referring to the clothes. "No braid, no ribbon, no camellia, no jewellery - yet it looks Chanel. No idea is also an idea."
5/12No ideas! But the collection was riddled with them, so that the eyes moved in bemusement, as if following the swerves of airplanes coming into land: eyes up to trim caps, turned backwards; then to a matching weave patterned suit; down to the silvered shoes and the "Coco Carrier" as Chanel is calling its wheely bag. Buttons looked like crescent moons, eyes were covered in reflective glasses, and a sweater was intarsia knitted with red, white and blue aeroplanes.
6/12By the time Karl took a bow by picking up model Cara Delevingne from one of the benches in the "departure lounge" (blissfully almost empty), along with Karl's godson Hudson Kroenig, age 7, the fashion voyage seemed as long as the foot travel from check-in to boarding.
7/12What was the real impression of the clothes as the models walked around this vast air hub, where a digital departure board marked the global travel of previous Chanel Cruise and Métier's d'Art shows, from Seoul to Salzburg?
8/12The clothes looked "grown up", which is a polite way of saying some of the severe tailoring seemed matronly. Others were so layered with pattern, as dresses were draped over pants, that it was hard to understand whether it was a take on more exotic airline uniforms or a way of mixing different pieces.
