SEW CHIC: Guests at the Chanel haute couture show in Paris on Tuesday got a glimpse behind the scenes, as Karl Lagerfeld decided to show the made-to-measure creations in an atelier setting staffed with the luxury house’s seamstresses.
Willow Smith and her dad Will Smith, Jessica Chastain, Vanessa Paradis and Marianne Faithfull took in two separate displays on Tuesday morning. It was a family affair, with Milla Jovovich bringing her daughter Ever and Inès de la Fressange coming with her girls, Nine and Violette d’Urso.
Also present was Caroline de Maigret, who was named a spokeswoman and ambassador for Chanel in an announcement made after the show.
“It was really special,” Chastain said of the set. “Sometimes you forget all of the work that happens behind the scenes, and I thought how wonderful it was for them to be showcased.”
Particularly impressive was the fact that the “petites mains” – or “little hands,” as they are known in France – barely looked up from their work. “I don’t think that they were pretending to work, and I think that’s why they were so in character, because they were just doing what they do every day,” Chastain marveled.
The actress, in Paris for a few days, has found the perfect antidote to the foul weather: “Shopping. I spent a lot of time in the Bon Marché this week.”
Willow Smith recently shot her first Chanel campaign with Lagerfeld, and admitted she felt nervous at first, although the designer quickly put her at ease.
“When you talk to an artist and it’s just you and the artist, instead of business people or someone trying to tell you what to do, how much it’s gonna cost, how much ‘bla bla bla’ – it was just really comforting,” she said.
The 15-year-old recently joined her father on stage to perform his hit “Summertime,” but she hopes to release new tracks of her own late this year or early next year. “I’m actually working on my album as we speak,” she said. “I think it’s going to be very, very different from my other stuff. I think people are going to be pretty surprised.”
Paradis stopped to greet one of the seamstresses as she arrived. The French singer and actress knows the in-house teams well, having starred in Chanel campaigns since 1991. “They are fabulous women – super talented and hardworking. I think they are fascinating,” she said.
Paradis will star opposite her former partner Johnny Depp and their daughter Lily-Rose in her next movie, “Yoga Hosers,” set for a September release. “Johnny has a supporting role, but the movie is about the two young girls. I have a cameo, and I appear in a scene with my daughter and Harley Quinn Smith,” she said.
Hayley Gates is preparing to film the second season of her fashion docuseries “States of Undress” on Vice’s television channel Viceland. After Pakistan, Venezuela and Palestine, she plans to train her eye on Paris with a special shooting next September. “It’s a little more political, but I can’t tell you what it’s about yet,” she teased. “There’s some interesting things going on here, I think.”
After that, it will be back to more exotic destinations. “There’s many places I’d like to go. We’re thinking Iran, maybe Vietnam, Haiti, perhaps North Korea if we’ll be let in. They have an amazing presentation of fashion there,” she said.