Tweed and La Tour Eiffel at Chanel's couture show – photo essay

Chanel’s wedding dress under a replica of the Eiffel Tower at the Grand Palais museum in Paris Photograph: Patrick Kovarik/AFP/Getty Images

Karl Lagerfeld doesn’t do things by halves. For this season’s spectacular couture show, it was the turn of the Eiffel Tower to get the Chanel treatment, as models walked under the arched legs of a reconstruction in Paris’s Grand Palais.

Models in circular-bottomed, black gowns on the Chanel couture autumn/winter 2017/2018 catwalk. Photograph: Francois Mori/AP

Returning to the wide, exaggerated silhouette he championed in his last haute couture collection, the effect was bold and modern, while maintaining Chanel’s classic love of tweed.

Models wore Coco Chanel's signature boater hat and gobstopper-sized pearl stud earrings rimmed with tweed

Tweed hats, giant earrings and rainbow ombré eye shadow. Photograph: Stephane Cardinale/Corbis via Getty Images

Dominican model Lineisy Montero on the Chanel Couture catwalk. Photograph: Etienne Laurent/EPA

Plumed shoulders and a long-layered shift dress at Chanel. Photograph: Gonzalo Fuentes/Reuters

The models wore tweed with circular embellishments. Photograph: Stephane Cardinale/Corbis via Getty Images

• Makeup was 80s meets birds of paradise.

Voluminous tweed coats formed part of the new Chanel silhouette. Photograph: Gonzalo Fuentes/Reuters

Buttoned up

You are never that far from a two-piece suit at a Chanel show, and Monsieur Lagerfeld riffed on the iconic tweed suit, adding boaters to match.

Oversized jackets with patent ankle boots on the Chanel couture catwalk.
Photograph: Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images

A long-line tweed coat with matching boater hat. Photograph: Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images

Jacket sleeves were curved and exaggerated, hemlines low.

Cream and white, Chanel’s take on the classic bridal gown. Photograph: WWD/REX/Shutterstock

Bridal

A wedding dress typically closes the Chanel couture show.

A model presents a creation by German designer Karl Lagerfeld. Photograph: Gonzalo Fuentes/Reuters

This season’s take was a simple white dress that flared just above the waist, embellished with ruffles and finished with a simple net train.

Oversized circular feathered pockets on a suit. Photograph: Gonzalo Fuentes/Reuters

Details

Feathers decorated pockets, hemlines, collars and sleeve cuffs.

Feather-embellished sleeves at Chanel. Photograph: Maitre/WWD/REX/Shutterstock

Circular shoulder and collar detail on boucle dress. Photograph: Maitre/WWD/REX/Shutterstock

It’s a vision of a revived Parisian woman, it is all about cut, shapes, silhouettes

Karl Lagerfeld

Ankle boots covered with tweed with a perspex-block heel. Photograph: Maitre/WWD/REX/Shutterstock

Black patent perspex-block-heel ankle boots. Photograph: Maitre/WWD/REX/Shutterstock

• Victoriana-style black patent boots were everywhere – the old-fashioned shape contrasting with a contemporary perspex-block heel.

Pharrell Williams and Helen Lasichanh. Photograph: Jacopo Raule/GC Images

Star power

It was a starry affair. Pharrell, who arrived with wife, Helen Lasichanh, went for multicoloured tie-dye complete with a statement to get the cogs whirring: “We are all powered by the sun.”

Kristen Stewart arriving at the Chanel show. Photograph: Jacopo Raule/GC Images

Katy Perry arriving at the Chanel show. Photograph: Jacopo Raule/GC Images

• Return to the forbidden planet … Kristen Stewart, in a spaceman grey-silver jumpsuit, and Katy Perry, wearing an astronaut print, both attended.
  

Cara Delevingne, in Chanel, showcasing her new buzzcut. Photograph: Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images

Peroxide blonde buzzcuts – with frosted tips in Stewart’s case – were out in full force, including on model Cara Delevingne.

Julianne Moore in Chanel. Photograph: Stephane Cardinale/Corbis via Getty Images

Model, author, and designer Ines De La Fressange. Photograph: Swan Gallet/WWD/REX/Shutterstock

• Julianne Moore and Ines De La Fressange arriving for the show.

Karl Lagerfeld received a standing ovation on the catwalk Chanel show. Photograph: WWD/REX/Shutterstock

• Karl Lagerfeld received a standing ovation after the show. He has today been awarded Paris’ highest honour, the Grand Vermeil medal.