Matthieu Blazy Named Chanel’s New Creative Director

PARIS — At a time when luxurious manufacturers are biking by means of designers at rising pace, Chanel hopes to have discovered a long-term match in Matthieu Blazy.

The French home mentioned on Thursday it has chosen the previous Bottega Veneta inventive director as its new creative director of vogue actions, placing an finish to months of hypothesis across the place described as probably the most coveted job in vogue.

This follows a report on WWD.com on Nov. 14 that Blazy had emerged as a number one contender for the plum Paris put up.

Blazy will likely be answerable for all high fashion, ready-to-wear and equipment collections and can report back to Bruno Pavlovsky, president of vogue and president of Chanel SAS.

The 40-year-old designer is because of be part of the home within the first half of 2025, almost definitely in April, and can present his first assortment in October, Pavlovsky informed WWD in an interview.

Chanel views it as a critical dedication.

“We hope to be collectively for 10, 15 years or extra. We’re simply in the beginning of our story,” the manager mentioned. “Together we’ll be capable of write a brand new chapter for the model.”

Blazy succeeds Virginie Viard, who exited Chanel final June after an uneven five-year tenure. He turns into solely the fourth official inventive director within the historical past of the 114-year-old model, recognized for its tweed fits, quilted purses and No.5 fragrance.

A variety of lesser-known designers, together with Ramon Esparza, an acolyte of Cristóbal Balenciaga, and Philippe Guibourgé, finest recognized for designing the Miss Dior line, created its collections between the loss of life of founder Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel in 1971 and the arrival of Karl Lagerfeld in 1983.

“I’m thrilled and honored to hitch the great home of Chanel. I look ahead to assembly all of the groups and penning this new chapter collectively,” Blazy mentioned in a press release offered to WWD.

With Blazy’s appointment, the Rue Cambon home is definitively turning the web page on the period of Lagerfeld, who was its inventive director for 36 years, with Viard as his right-hand lady.

But the honeymoon should wait, as Blazy has to sit down out the noncompete clause of his contract along with his earlier employer, Kering, which confirmed his departure on Thursday and named Louise Trotter his successor.

In his three years main Bottega Veneta, Blazy made the model’s present one of many hottest tickets in Milan, attracting the likes of Jacob Elordi, Julianne Moore, A$AP Rocky, Michelle Yeoh and Kendall Jenner to his newest show.

He was appointed inventive director of Bottega Veneta in November 2021, when he rose from ready-to-wear designer to succeed Daniel Lee on the design helm, marking his ascension to the highest rungs of vogue after a profession within the shadows with manufacturers together with Raf Simons, Maison Margiela and Celine.

The French Belgian designer has gained constant approval for collections hinged on refined, grown-up stylish, and haute craftsmanship.

He’s additionally been gaining renown as a vogue showman able to pulse-pounding runway motion and imaginative units, which for spring 2025 consisted of leather-based beanbag chairs in 15 animal shapes.

“Matthieu Blazy is among the most gifted designers of his technology,” Alain Wertheimer, world government chairman, and Leena Nair, world chief government officer of Chanel, mentioned in a joint assertion.

“His imaginative and prescient and expertise will reinforce the power of the model and our place as a pacesetter in luxurious. Under Bruno Pavlovsky’s management, we’re assured that Matthieu Blazy will proceed to form what’s subsequent and write a brand new web page in Chanel’s creation,” they added. 

Pavlovsky revealed that Blazy edged out two different finalists to snag the put up, following an exhaustive search that thought-about not simply top-tier designers however “quantity twos, quantity threes and quantity fours” throughout the business.

In the final six months, the rumor mill has churned out potential candidates together with Hedi Slimane, Simon Porte Jacquemus and Pieter Mulier. Pavlovsky declined to substantiate any names however mentioned the expertise pool was thriving.

“Genuinely, all of the folks we met have been nice and I perceive why luxurious and vogue have such power,” he mentioned.

“Very rapidly, we narrowed it down to 3 folks with whom we spoke, however Matthieu stood out instantly as a result of he has a monitor file, a imaginative and prescient of Chanel and a modernity that seduced us,” he continued.

“We selected the individual whose values, expertise and imaginative and prescient of girls, of our purchasers, have been one of the best match for us. And a key level for me was that I sensed nice admiration and respect for the heritage and the work executed by Mademoiselle Chanel, by Karl and by Virginie,” Pavlovsky mentioned.

“That was vital to me, as a result of it wasn’t a couple of form of competitors over picture and measurement. It was concerning the depth of what the model stands for, and the way we might construct on that to proceed telling our story,” he famous.

It marks the primary time the privately owned firm has recruited an exterior candidate for the highest vogue inventive put up since Lagerfeld was appointed in 1983. Viard was seen as his pure successor after the legendary designer’s loss of life in 2019.

The legendary German designer had engineered one of many trendy vogue business’s first and most profitable model rejuvenations and propelled the fabled French title from close to obscurity to the summit of worldwide luxurious.

Viard gave the model a extra female bent and sought to enchantment to a youthful and extra numerous demographic together with her athletic-inspired garments, multiplying Chanel’s ready-to-wear enterprise by 2.5 throughout her tenure. But on-line commenters skewered her final collections and the model felt the time had come for a change.

Born in Paris in 1984, Blazy is a graduate of famed visible arts college La Cambre in Brussels, and he began his vogue profession as males’s designer for Raf Simons.

From 2016 to 2019, Blazy labored at Calvin Klein as a part of the workforce Simons dropped at New York, engaged on the lads’s and girls’s collections as design director.

Before Calvin Klein, Blazy labored within the studio of Celine below then-creative director Phoebe Philo, turning into senior designer in 2014, and for 4 years at Maison Margiela.

Chanel took its time to plot its subsequent transfer although the inventive transition coincided with a interval of stalled demand in China, the place it staged its latest Métiers d’Art present, and a drop in spending amongst aspirational clients in Western markets.

This displays the energy the model, a key level for Chanel’s administration workforce led by Nair.

“We outlined the factors that have been important for Chanel, and amongst these standards, there may be clearly the model earlier than the character,” Pavlovsky mentioned.

“I gained’t title names, however some folks have proven they will transfer from model to model and their fashion stays pretty an identical, and the model has to adapt,” he mentioned.

“Our model is powerful and has stood the take a look at of time. It stands for values that we need to nurture. It’s not about carrying another person’s imaginative and prescient. We imagine that Matthieu’s expertise and energy lies in the truth that he has the capability to return into the model and drive it ahead,” he added.

The stakes are excessive. Chanel once more delivered file revenues in 2023, with gross sales up 16 % at comparable charges to $19.7 billion, though worth will increase alone accounted for a 9 % development.

In the final decade the corporate has greater than doubled its revenues and headcount, and now ranks because the world’s second-largest luxurious model behind Louis Vuitton, with 36,500 staff on the finish of 2023.

Blazy will likely be anticipated to churn out 10 collections a 12 months, together with two high fashion collections, six ready-to-wear collections, together with the cruise and Métiers d’Art reveals, and two “tactical” strains, Coco Beach and Coco Neige.

His remit doesn’t prolong to the perfume and cosmetics, or jewellery and watches divisions, which have completely different enterprise fashions, mentioned Pavlovsky, who emphasised that teamwork was key to Chanel’s continued success.

“Chanel’s vogue enterprise has develop into enormous. After all, we’re 10 or 15 occasions the dimensions of Bottega Veneta or some rising manufacturers,” he mentioned.

“You can’t have one individual doing all the things. It’s the product of a robust and skilled collective working in tandem with an individual who units the tone with a set or a present,” Pavlovsky insisted.

Revenues at Bottega Veneta totaled 1.6 billion euros in 2023 and the model posted 4 % natural development within the first 9 months of 2024, bucking the general adverse development at Kering.  

While Chanel dwarfs his earlier employers in scale, Blazy has some key {qualifications}. He comes with expertise in high fashion, having designed Margiela’s Artisanal line.  

“It’s one thing he finds very inspiring, and little question an enormous a part of what makes Chanel so engaging,” Pavlovsky mentioned. “With high fashion, designers expertise moments of pure pleasure.”

Crucially, Blazy has a monitor file of delivering fascinating purses at Bottega Veneta, together with his hit Kalimero, Andiamo and Sardine types.

“Chanel is at first concerning the product,” Pavlovsky mentioned. “Matthieu is enthusiastic about it, and it reveals. The method he did such an distinctive job of reenergizing the product at Bottega Veneta, over a really brief time period, demonstrates that that is really his signature.”

His appointment is the newest step in a long-term succession plan set in movement with Nair’s arrival in 2021. The former Unilever government assumed a title beforehand held by Wertheimer, who then grew to become world government chair of the corporate.

However, Wertheimer stays a key decision-maker and is claimed to have personally knowledgeable Viard of his resolution to herald a brand new designer.

“There is a generational handover underway, and that generational change has to replicate the occasions. It’s a part of a course of that’s important to make sure the long run energy of the model,” Pavlovsky mentioned.

“Today, we’re a big, highly effective company with a number of enterprise fashions and our group must replicate the dimensions and necessities of this firm,” he added. “Matthieu’s arrival suits completely into this dynamic.”

Like Lagerfeld earlier than him, Blazy has signed a renewable contract for his providers, the manager mentioned. While he didn’t give a length for the preliminary time period, he mentioned Blazy would have two years to search out his bearings at Chanel, in line with his “genuine” strategy.

“Matthieu has a deep imaginative and prescient of the model that may permit us to go even additional than with a extra show-off strategy that goes quick. I believe that quite the opposite, he’s somebody who has to maneuver at his personal tempo,” Pavlovsky mentioned.

“We have an excellent feeling about it, however we’ve given ourselves two years, which is the time it takes to get a really feel for the model. I’m tremendous assured, however now we’ve got to do the work,” he added.