The creative director changes don’t seem to stop this week. Now the successor at Chanel seems to have been clarified: Matthieu Blazy will be artistic director for the fashion division.
The French fashion house is said to have announced the appointment of the former head designer of Bottega Veneta on Thursday evening, several industry media outlets, including WWD, report. Blazy takes over the haute couture, ready-to-wear and accessories collections at Chanel. He reports to Bruno Pavlovsky, president of the Chanel fashion department.
The news comes shortly after French luxury goods group Kering SA announced the appointment of Louise Trotter as creative director of the Bottega Veneta brand. She will take up the position in January, succeeding Blazy, whose departure was not official until then. However, like Hedi Slimane, Simone Porte Jacquemus and John Galliano, whose departure from Margiela was announced on Wednesday, he was one of the hotly discussed candidates for the Chanel position.
Blazy has worked at Bottega Veneta as creative director since January 2021, succeeding Daniel Lee, who later went to Burberry. He came from our own ranks and was responsible for the ready-to-wear area as design director. Before that, he worked with Raf Simons from 2016 to 2019 at the US label Calvin Klein. He also worked as a senior designer at Céline, as well as at Raf Simons and Maison Martin Margiela.
At Chanel he is now taking over for Virginie Viard. The farewell to the designer, who was considered the right hand of the late fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld and then took over artistic direction for him, became known at the beginning of June.