Chanel Métiers d’Art [Pre-Fall 2023] Show in Dakar, Senegal Did Not Go 'Badly Wrong'
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Chanel invited 800 guests to Dakar, Senegal for its new Metiers d’Art collection presentation. Pharrell Williams, Naomi Campbell, and Tobe Nwigwe were on-hand for the French house’s first-ever show in Africa and the first show for any luxury house in sub-Saharan Africa.
The show was also Virginie Ward’s the first show outside of France, since becoming artistic director in 2019.
Note: all images courtesy of Chanel.
Bruno Pavlovsky, president of fashion at Chanel, spoke openly with Vogue Business that now more than ever business cannot be conducted as it was in a prepandemic world.
AOC adds a pre-George Floyd murder-world as well, and Pavlovsky spoke candidly about Senegal’s reality as a former French colony.
Lying three miles west of Dakar, Gorée Island was the largest slave-trading center on the African coast. “We cannot go to other parts of the world just for 20 minutes. It is not enough. We have to have this dialogue,” the Chanel executive acknowledged.
Pharrell Williams is intimately involved in bringing Chanel forward in its thinking and embracing progessive values, especially around the multicultural attitudes of today’s progressives, as part of its 21st century DNA.
I have checked my tongue on more than one occasion about Chanel and race, because Pharrell has asked his community to give him time to have impact at Chanel. Time given, of course, as Pharrell requested.
The Chanel Show in Dakar Didn’t Go ‘Badly Wrong’
As Vanessa Friedman wrote “It could have gone badly wrong.” Note, we put a complimentary link to Friedman, who does an excellent job at wrestling with all the issues piled up like planes on a runway from a Chanel brand heritage standpoint, a design overview and also a cultural experience vs the actual clothes, as Chanel goes to Africa.
The show did not go ‘badly wrong.’ It did not.
“I cannot say Madame Chanel dreamed to come to Dakar,” said Bruno Pavlovsky, Chanel’s president of fashion, as referenced by Friedman.
AOC will not critique the Chanel show from a historical cultural perspective or even a recent ad campaign, where I had plenty to say about these very issues.
Chanel took an excellent first step forward in Senegal. The brand commissioned photography from son of Senegal, Malick Blodian, both before the event and during it.
Few of us white people in fashion are in a position to embark on a voyage like this one, based on our own experiences and instincts. To Chanel’s credit, the brand seems to be tapping into top talent and people in the know, to help navigate these reverse-direction waters.
AOC is working on a separate post to highlight all the talent that participated in the three-day Chanel Métiers d’Art Show in Dakar.
In contrast to Dior Men’s in Egypt, the Chanel show did not feel as if at home in its surroundings. It was more of a museum show than anything organic.
However, we can’t judge Chanel against Dior. Nothing constructive transpires.
I will say that with the state of global politics and the rise of the alt-right — coupled with the reality that progressives of every age are downright exasperated with the speed of change — Chanel is skating on significantly thinner ice than either Christian Dior or Louis Vuitton, who have far deeper ties to Black culture and Africa itself, cultivated over the last decade.
So let’s see where the Chanel adventure in global relations goes next. It’s a Harvard Business School case study for certain. Many of us have to respect Chanel’s candor on this subject. That is an excellent first step. ~ Anne
