Dakar – an influential artistic capital for 2023 Métiers d’art CHANEL

2022/2023 Métiers d’art CHANEL – DAKAR fashion show.

The city of Dakar was chosen as the location for the 2022/23 Métiers d’art CHANEL – DAKAR collection, following meetings over the past three years between Virginie Viard and friends of the French luxury brand who have either lived there, are carrying out artistic projects there, or who are drawn to the city’s creative effervescence.

An influential artistic capital on the international scene, particularly in fields dear to CHANEL, such as fashion, cinema, dance, literature, contemporary art and music, Dakar marks the beginning of an ongoing exchange between the luxury House and Senegal.

Against the majestic backdrop of Dakar’s former Palais de Justice, with its rhythmic columns and sunlit inner garden, the 2022/23 Métiers d’art CHANEL – DAKAR collection celebrated the spirit of the 1970s with silhouettes with vibrating colours and richly ornate embroideries of beads and sequins, Chanel’s textured tweeds and floral motives.

“It’s first and foremost a story of encounters,” says Bruno Pavlovsky, President of CHANEL SAS and of 𝘭𝘦19M, about the presentation of the Métiers d’art 2022/23 CHANEL – Dakar collection.

Imagined by Virginie Viard and crafted between the CHANEL Ready-to-Wear ateliers in Paris and the Maisons d’art of 𝘭𝘦19M, the 2022/23 Métiers d’art CHANEL – DAKAR collection is the result of multiple meetings over the past three years between Virginie Viard and artists of all backgrounds: the choreographer Dimitri Chamblas who called on Germaine Acogny’s École des Sables dancers, but also directors, musicians and writers, all together with friends of the House.

The show is part of a vast cultural programme and the starting point of an ongoing exchange between the luxury fashion House and Senegal.

On December 7th, 2022, the day after the show, the House organised a talk in Dakar’s former Palais de Justice, in Senegal, in front of an audience made up of pupils and students, artists and local and international guests. This discussion also brought together the ambassador of the House, Pharrell Williams, the architect and scenographer Mamy Tall, as well as several artists that collaborated with Virginie Viard on the artistic programme surrounding the show: choreographers Dimitri Chamblas and Germaine Acogny, founder of the École des Sables, and musician and rapper NIX.

Together, they discussed the artistic creation in Senegal and the transmission of savoir-faire.

Bruno Pavlovsky also evoked CHANEL’s approach and its first fashion show in West Africa, with a collection imagined by Virginie Viard which aims to pay tribute to the virtuosity of the CHANEL Maisons d’art.

It was also an opportunity to announce the first international exhibition of 𝘭𝘢 Galerie 𝘥𝘶 19M in Dakar, which will be held from January 12th to March 31st and designed by the scenographer Mamy Tall, at the heart of IFAN (Théodore Monod-Institut fondamental d’Afrique noire). The general public will be able to discover a series of initiatives in collaboration with Senegalese artists, craftsmen and cultural institutions.