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CHANEL METRO AFFAIRS
I’ll admit it: flying in from Los Angeles and ending up squeezed between those rusty red columns on the 5th Ave Subway platform, with trains rumbling by every few minutes, wasn’t exactly how I pictured walking into a Chanel show. In L.A., they roll out a red carpet even to get a latte; here, the only red thing in sight was the steel beams scratched by decades of commuters. And somehow, it already felt right.
Matthieu Blazy didn’t just “bring Chanel into the subway.” He did something far more delicate: he dropped haute couture into the most honest, unfiltered place in the city, without cushioning it, without elevating it, without giving it a protective halo. He let it sit there, in the raw pulse of real life, exposed to speed, noise, distraction. And as I waited for the first look to step out of the train car, I felt something thrilling: Chanel wasn’t trying to interpret New York.
It was listening to it.
The first model exited the train like she’d done it her whole life. Bold jewelry, black turban, a shot of red at the waist — a visual punch with the wattage of Times Square, yet refined through that French discipline that gives structure even to chaos. Then the leopard tweed appeared, purring with confidence, and suddenly I realized we weren’t watching clothes at all. We were watching attitude.
One thing about the subway: nothing stays still. As I photographed a model in a beautifully cut pinstripe suit, a train pulled out behind her, dragging that metallic roar that is the city’s true soundtrack. Blazy knew it. He wanted it. He turned the environment itself into part of the creative direction, as if the world, for once, had agreed to collaborate.
And the colors — the reinvented animal prints, the long dresses skimming the platform, silhouettes moving with the same rhythm as commuters bracing for a stop. Chanel, a house that often exists inside immaculate spaces, was here breathing, sweating, reacting. And it was perfect.
What struck me most was this: nothing, absolutely nothing, looked out of place.
Tulle, feathers, sequins… everything fit seamlessly into a setting we had instinctively labeled as “wrong.” But maybe that’s the lesson: fashion isn’t an altar — it’s a passageway. And Blazy, by choosing this subway, reminded us with almost brutal elegance.
I left the station feeling like I’d witnessed a collision rather than a show. A beautiful, intelligent, coherent collision.
Proof that Chanel can own any environment — but more importantly, that it can still surprise those who thought they had it fully figured out.
As I climbed the stairs back to street level, I smiled. Sometimes it takes a train to understand where fashion is headed.
— Sarah Dalmonte, Los Angeles → New York
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SARA DAL MONTE 