Chanel is easy to identify but hard to explain. And yet, the brand’s studio does it beautifully in the Haute Couture Spring/Summer 2025 collection. It was a classically Chanel offering—staged in a monumental CC metal structure in the middle of the Grand Palais, of course!

The tweed jacket, the canon reinvented, is reimagined in youthful ways. With rounded hems or leg-of-mutton sleeves, satin linings, or adorned with bows—the additions to the silhouette were never heavy or bulky but instead light-hearted. It was Chanel at its softest. Unlike most other collections today, where the cultural current is considered literally, here we see a different, yet equally interesting, strategy. The approach was Rococo-like. Yes, the world is on fire, but why should Chanel be the place where that is reflected? Instead, the studio proposes a more fitting approach. This is Haute Couture— where beauty lives, the kind we can find solace in.

And beautiful it was. Iridescent hand-painted rainbows were splattered on jackets, satin opera coats were layered over minis, embroidered capelets sat atop matching dresses, tied with a velvet bow—even at its most ornate, lightness was commanding. The final look, a high-low wedding dress, even if voluminous, felt playful, capped with an embroidered light jacket.

The studio did what a studio does best: it held down the fort, creating a collection that reads as quintessentially Chanel yet refreshingly modern. There’s no need to reinvent the wheel—its creative leaders over 115 years of history have done it time and time again. And hopefully, so will Matthieu Blazy come next season. For now, resting on the shoulders of giants is more than enough.

Words by Pedro Vasconcelos

CHANEL HAUTE COUTURE SS25

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