Matthieu Blazy’s haute couture debut carried high expectations. He is only the fourth designer in Chanel’s 116-year history, making spring 2026 a milestone for the oldest continuously operating couture house. Yet with two jubilant collections, spring 2026 ready-to-wear and 2026 métiers d’art, already behind him, Blazy embraced the moment with playfulness rather than solemnity. Early clues hinted at fairytale whimsy, drawing on the iconography of classic Disney films. A short animated teaser clip on Chanel’s Instagram showed birds, chipmunks, rabbits, and other forest creatures lending the petits mains a helping hand in the atelier, like the mice who finish Cinderella’s ballgown. Even the invitation, a silver pillbox pendant shaped like the magic mushroom Alice samples in Wonderland, promised enchantment.
The show set under the glass-vaulted ceiling of the Grand Palais did not disappoint. A fairy ring of giant mushrooms in bubblegum pink, fuchsia, sunny yellow, and other cheerful shades circled the runway, evoking some of Karl Lagerfeld’s most memorable nature-inspired fantasias. The Amanita muscaria in particular seemed a subtle nod to a rare Lagerfeld-era mushroom-shaped quilted bag, its distinctive red cap dotted with white CCs, which Claudia Schiffer carried in the spring 1992 show. And then, of course, there were the delightful clothes. The opening look was a classic—but not so classic—Chanel suit, done in transparent silk mousseline instead of bouclé. This luminous reinterpretation felt like a memory of the house’s layered histories.
The palimpsest became a leitmotif of the collection, with layered transparency playing out in candy-spun pastel tunic tops worn under cropped jackets and over wide-leg pants or pencil skirts. Chanel’s other icons—N°5 perfume, red lipstick, and, of course, the 2.55 bag—were also rendered in silk mousseline or reimagined as jewelry. Nature-inspired details appeared throughout the collection, from the heels of two-tone pumps shaped like mushrooms to billowing pleated tops that recalled the gills on their undersides. Birds were another subtle callback to the house’s legacy, from Coco Chanel’s gilded birdcage at 31 Rue Cambon to the iconic ’90s perfume ad starring Vanessa Paradis and Riley Keough’s later interpretation of “When Doves Cry” atop a giant swing in Chanel’s spring 2025 show. Featherwork has long been a hallmark of couture, and here avian-friendly plumage emerged through embroidery, layering, pleating, and weaving, culminating in a sense of nature renewed.
