Chanel designer Virginie Viard showcased a timeless, feminine collection against the romantic setting of the Seine river
Paris Couture Week typically calls for extravagant displays, and while fashion brands like Schiaparelli and Thom Browne certainly delivered on that front with their haute couture fall/winter 2023 presentations, Chanel went in another direction—and right onto the scenic banks of Paris’s Seine river.
This season, Chanel designer Virginie Viard contemplated a quality that has defined the French fashion brand ever since it was founded by Coco Chanel: the elusive “Parisienne allure”, more commonly known as French girl chic. It’s what has made style icons out of women like Vanessa Paradis, the French actress (and mother of Lily-Rose Depp) who starred in a teaser for the fashion show.
As Viard explained it in a statement, “Playing with opposites and contrasts, with nonchalance and elegance, is like standing on a line between strength and delicacy, which, at Chanel, is what we call allure.”
Chanel’s latest haute couture fashion show offered a whole wardrobe based on that idea. As models strolled down the paved street, they did so in elegant tweed coats that are sure to serve their owners for a lifetime; floral dresses intricately covered in sequins that caught the light as they moved; or gossamer gowns cut from silk chiffon that turned their wearers into an ethereal vision.
Read more: Watch the Chanel haute couture fall/winter 2023 show at Paris Fashion Week