Tilda Swinton takes us inside CHANEL’s Métiers d’art campaign in Hangzhou- RUSSH

CHANEL’s latest Métiers d’art campaign is a journey: one that begins in the storied Paris apartment of Gabrielle Chanel and unfurls through the misty twilight of Hangzhou’s West Lake. For the 2024/25 collection, the House imagines a visual voyage where memory, craftsmanship, and culture are interwoven.

Shot by Mikael Jansson in the same soft dusk that bathed the December runway, the campaign draws on both place and time. A lacquered Coromandel screen — the very same one found in Gabrielle Chanel’s home — acts as a symbolic bridge between continents. Covered in painted landscapes, the screen becomes a muse: its motifs refracted through silhouettes, textures, and ornamentation.

To tell this story, the House called upon ambassadors Tilda Swinton and Liu Wen, along with model Lulu Tenney, who wear pieces that reflect the dialogue between continents and time.

“I had the great fortune to travel twice last year with CHANEL to Hangzhou: firstly, with Wim Wenders to shoot a short film inspired by the innate link between the House and this magical place as seen on the sensational Coromandel screen in Gabrielle Chanel’s apartment that depicts 17th century West Lake, and all the details of life lived there,” Swinton recalled.

“And then, a few weeks later, to attend the show taking place in that very location, on the surface of the lake itself. It is no exaggeration to use the word ‘magical’ for the time we spent there. Hangzhou is a place that exists somehow beyond time, and to return so soon after discovering it, to find it again, was a true thrill for us.”

As always, each look showcases the quiet mastery of CHANEL’s ateliers — Lesage, Montex, Lemarié, Lognon, among others — whose technical brilliance lies in the details: pleats with sculptural presence, embroidery that recalls ancient scrollwork, and jewellery crafted like fragments of night sky.

“I think of the Métiers d’art as a jewel in the crown of CHANEL’s achievements. It places the hand right at the centre and at the highest pinnacle of each collection,” Swinton mused. “And in setting itself the challenge to respond directly with the specific cultural landscape being celebrated, it always feels like a deep dive into a world of references and particularities utterly unique to each location, that are then filtered back into and through the code of CHANEL’s far-reaching iconography.”

The palette leans into shadow. A long black leather coat adorned with a camellia brooch evokes a mysterious allure, while Liu Wen wears a pleated charmeuse gown with soft floral motifs and a ruffled collar shaped with improbable delicacy. Evening wear arrives in layers: semi-sheer lace, velvet appliqué, and celestial-toned necklaces that recall a glint of moonlight dancing on the West Lake.

Daylight returns in silk satin separates, their structure softened by airy pleats. And for the traveller who moves effortlessly between China and Paris, there is plenty of accessories. Among them, lofty quilted travel bags, a patent vanity case, and a variation of the new CHANEL 25 bag in sparkling black tweed. Here, travel is not simply a theme, but a metaphor for transformation, as craft becomes couture, and imagination becomes form.

“We were blessed with an exquisite early morning mist which meant we felt lost in time there, standing on the banks of the site we know well from (Gabrielle) Chanel’s panoramic screen,” Swinton recalled of the shoot itself. The architectural silhouettes of the looks I was privileged to wear stood out against the sky and trees. There was a real serenity and calm on this shoot: happy, relaxed and familiar, like a homecoming. It was very touching considering Gabrielle Chanel never made it there… We made the journey in her stead.”

And as for le19M, the Parisienne hub that makes collections like the latest Métiers d’art possible, Swinton says it’s her very favourite of all. “Some 800 artisans gathered together under one roof, a constellation of exceptional and long-storied Maisons each with their own expertise – feathers, pleating, millinery, beadwork, embroidery… – empowered by CHANEL to continue their invaluable work without threat of closure or compromise. To spend days there, creeping from table to table, to join in the meticulous, alchemical work there – that would be a dream for me…”