February 27, 2018 |
Kaia Gerber has been invited into the world of Chanel, ushered through its pearly gates by Saint Lagerfeld, into a celestial realm seen here in its earthly incarnation as Mademoiselle Chanel’s actual apartment. Of course, Ms Gerber has already walked several times for Chanel and opened their Spring RTW show, ‘already’ being the recurring word for most of this 16-year old’s accolades, but with her debut campaign for the House, she enters a new, rarefied atmosphere. In front of a hugely impressive collection of leather-bound tomes, the sort that say, “I’m actually, like, really smart”, Kaia reclines on the same generous fawn suede sofa that Coco and her closest friends were famously pictured on, cradling an assortment of Chanel’s latest handbags as though she had done so for an eternity, and Karl were merely an inquisitive visitor armed with a camera. This is the story as old as bags themselves, the love between a woman and her bag, inseparable and unconditional, here played out among physical vessels imbued with Coco Chanel’s memory, emotion and touch. Thankfully she resists the temptations that overcome us mere mortals in moments such as these – I once swallowed a bit of water in a pool I knew Michael Phelps had swam in – but Kaia, we presume, keeps her cool in this brilliant debut campaign.
