The CHANEL Spring Summer 2026 Haute Couture collection begins with a quiet question.
What makes CHANEL, CHANEL? Where does its essence reside? Newly appointed Artistic Director of Fashion Activities Matthieu Blazy approaches this inquiry through Haute Couture, the very foundation of the House, seeking to reveal its innermost core.
©CHANEL
Blazy proposes not merely garments, but the relationship between clothing and the woman who wears it.
Haute Couture is not a static creation but an existence completed through the wearer. It accompanies the body, becoming a medium through which memory, emotion, and personal narrative emerge. Haute Couture exists as a canvas upon which each woman composes her own story.
©CHANEL
The show unfolds with the structure of a haiku.
Silhouettes appear within a stylised natural landscape, evoking a suspension of time. Here, beauty is not defined by permanence, but by presence within a fleeting moment. Haute Couture is presented not as a fixed form, but as a poetic phenomenon—something that appears, resonates, and disappears.
©CHANEL
The opening look—a CHANEL suit constructed from transparent silk mousseline—emerges as an embodiment of essence.
Stripped to its essential dimensions, it evokes the layered history of the House. At the same time, it becomes inseparable from the wearer’s own life, absorbing and reflecting her personal narrative. The garment does not reproduce the past; it acquires meaning anew through the living body.
©CHANEL
©CHANEL
©CHANEL
Symbols such as love letters, the N°5 bottle, and red lipstick appear embedded within the garments.
Rendered through embroidery, jewellery, or hidden within linings and pockets, these elements externalise inner emotional landscapes. What was once interior becomes visible. The garment reveals a symbolic inner life—an intimate dialogue between craft and wearer. It becomes both a literal and emotional love letter to Haute Couture itself.
©CHANEL
Gradually, a transformation unfolds at the centre of the collection.
The woman begins to assume the presence of a bird. Black looks evoke the raven, their precision tailoring demonstrating supreme cutting techniques, while fluid silhouettes introduce movement and lightness. Structure and motion coexist, dissolving the boundary between body and garment.
©CHANEL
©CHANEL
Through embroidery, pleating, layering, and weaving, colour and texture evoke plumage.
Yet feathers themselves are rarely used. Instead, Haute Couture craftsmanship conjures their presence. Pigeons, spoonbills, herons, and cockatoos emerge—not as literal reproductions, but as expressions of form, individuality, and transformation. Craft does not imitate nature; it reinterprets its essence.
©CHANEL
The bird becomes more than a symbol of freedom.
It becomes a metaphor for the woman herself. The body is no longer confined by gravity or structure. The garment ceases to impose form and instead enables liberation. Haute Couture is revealed not as constraint, but as a vehicle for freedom.
©CHANEL
Throughout this metamorphosis, the archetypes of CHANEL remain present.
They ground the collection while simultaneously existing within a dreamlike dimension. Tradition is not preserved as something fixed, but continuously reactivated within the present moment.
©CHANEL
And then, as suddenly as it appears, it is gone.
Haute Couture exists only within the instant. It leaves behind an emotional trace before disappearing, like a bird in flight.
Within that fleeting moment, the soul of CHANEL reveals itself.
What makes CHANEL, CHANEL? Where does its essence reside? Newly appointed Artistic Director of Fashion Activities Matthieu Blazy approaches this inquiry through Haute Couture, the very foundation of the House, seeking to reveal its innermost core.
©CHANELBlazy proposes not merely garments, but the relationship between clothing and the woman who wears it.
Haute Couture is not a static creation but an existence completed through the wearer. It accompanies the body, becoming a medium through which memory, emotion, and personal narrative emerge. Haute Couture exists as a canvas upon which each woman composes her own story.
©CHANELThe show unfolds with the structure of a haiku.
Silhouettes appear within a stylised natural landscape, evoking a suspension of time. Here, beauty is not defined by permanence, but by presence within a fleeting moment. Haute Couture is presented not as a fixed form, but as a poetic phenomenon—something that appears, resonates, and disappears.
©CHANELThe opening look—a CHANEL suit constructed from transparent silk mousseline—emerges as an embodiment of essence.
Stripped to its essential dimensions, it evokes the layered history of the House. At the same time, it becomes inseparable from the wearer’s own life, absorbing and reflecting her personal narrative. The garment does not reproduce the past; it acquires meaning anew through the living body.
©CHANEL©CHANEL©CHANELSymbols such as love letters, the N°5 bottle, and red lipstick appear embedded within the garments.
Rendered through embroidery, jewellery, or hidden within linings and pockets, these elements externalise inner emotional landscapes. What was once interior becomes visible. The garment reveals a symbolic inner life—an intimate dialogue between craft and wearer. It becomes both a literal and emotional love letter to Haute Couture itself.
©CHANELGradually, a transformation unfolds at the centre of the collection.
The woman begins to assume the presence of a bird. Black looks evoke the raven, their precision tailoring demonstrating supreme cutting techniques, while fluid silhouettes introduce movement and lightness. Structure and motion coexist, dissolving the boundary between body and garment.
©CHANEL©CHANELThrough embroidery, pleating, layering, and weaving, colour and texture evoke plumage.
Yet feathers themselves are rarely used. Instead, Haute Couture craftsmanship conjures their presence. Pigeons, spoonbills, herons, and cockatoos emerge—not as literal reproductions, but as expressions of form, individuality, and transformation. Craft does not imitate nature; it reinterprets its essence.
©CHANELThe bird becomes more than a symbol of freedom.
It becomes a metaphor for the woman herself. The body is no longer confined by gravity or structure. The garment ceases to impose form and instead enables liberation. Haute Couture is revealed not as constraint, but as a vehicle for freedom.
©CHANELThroughout this metamorphosis, the archetypes of CHANEL remain present.
They ground the collection while simultaneously existing within a dreamlike dimension. Tradition is not preserved as something fixed, but continuously reactivated within the present moment.
©CHANELAnd then, as suddenly as it appears, it is gone.
Haute Couture exists only within the instant. It leaves behind an emotional trace before disappearing, like a bird in flight.
Within that fleeting moment, the soul of CHANEL reveals itself.
