California Dreaming
Add Chanel to the luxury brands answering the siren call of California.
The French luxury house revealed Saturday that it will unveil its cruise 2024 collection in Los Angeles on May 9. Chanel did not specify the venue for the show, but noted that it presented the cruise 2008 collection designed by its late creative director Karl Lagerfeld inside Santa Monica airport.
“This show is an opportunity for the house to celebrate its connections with the City of Angels,” it said in a statement.
Chanel’s links with cinema date back to 1931, when movie mogul Sam Goldwyn invited founder Gabrielle Chanel to Hollywood. Her welcoming party at the
Los Angeles train station included Greta Garbo, and Chanel would go on to design costumes for actresses such as Gloria Swanson.
The house has costumed actresses ranging from
Kristen Stewart in “Spencer” to Jeanne Moreau in “Les Liaisons Dangereuses” and Cate Blanchett in “Blue Jasmine.” It also has longstanding partnerships with film events such as the Deauville American Film Festival in France and the Tribeca Film Festival in New York City.
California has become a hot spot for destination shows, with Celine, Ralph Lauren, Dior, Louis Vuitton and Saint Laurent among
brands that have mounted runway displays there in recent years.
While Lagerfeld was known for staging shows as far afield as Dubai, Singapore and
Cuba, Chanel creative director Virginie Viard has mostly stuck closer to home, especially since the coronavirus pandemic hampered international travel in the wake of her appointment.
She presented her cruise 2023 show in Monaco, with a repeat show in Miami in November. Signaling it is ready to resume destination shows overseas, Chanel staged its Métiers d’Art show in Senegal in December, with a repeat show in Tokyo planned on June 1.