The casino was deserted, the roulette tables empty. The space vibrated with a spooky subsonic intensity. Kristen Stewart emerged tentatively, crossed to a table, took a seat. She was quickly followed by a platoon of Karl's muses: Geraldine Chaplin, Rinko Kikuchi, Rita Ora, Lara Stone, Vanessa Paradis, Stella Tennant, and, finally, Julianne Moore, each of them wearing an outfit Lagerfeld had specially designed to reflect the way he saw them, for them and them alone. Then, while the chosen few gambled, the cookie-cutter models circled, production-line androids in seamless clothes that had been printed—some of them at least—by a computer the Chanel-ers call Sweetie. Lagerfeld was tickled pink at the thought of the most iconic jacket of the 20th century recreated for the 21st, using techniques that would have blown Chanel's mind. At the same time, there was the peculiar Terminator-like subtext, machines replacing man, even in the art of design. "But I sketch everything," Lagerfeld insisted. "The computer follows my sketches."
Even so, it was an extraordinarily ominous scenario. "I didn't feel that at all," Stewart demurred backstage. "I just wanted to find a seat where I felt lucky, where I could win big." But, with a lot of assistance from Michel Gaubert's portentous soundtrack, the collection had a distinctly adult, primarily dark, edging on decadent mood. In this context, even Barry White's uplifting "Love's Theme" that played out the finale took on a distinctly ironic flavor. The clones were uniformly heavy-browed, rouge-cheeked, and bewigged, like women Ex Machina (the fashion industry may have found a film to replace its deep-rooted affection for Gattaca). Combined with the wide-shouldered, box-shaped jackets, the look alluded to Joan Crawford, in keeping with the inspiration from the 1930s illustrations of Chanel's lover Paul Iribe that had come full-blown to Karl in a dream. He said that was about exploring a new way to emphasize the shoulders without pads, instead accentuating the line with epaulettes. It loaned a militant edge, which scarcely mitigated the sense of discomfort the collection provoked.
And yet, there was also an eerie beauty in the clothes. Knowing that computer-manipulated lasers had shaped the quilted fabric of the first looks added an X (Machina) factor. Later, there were swooping hems out of time, and those strange Chanel couture textures that hinted at handwork not of this world. Nadja Bender wore a funnel coat covered with crushed pink camellias that felt like a vision of Paris immediately before Chanel herself arrived on the scene to change fashion forever. The sense of epochs elided was overpowering.
The gambling metaphor was appropriate for a moment when the world's money markets are a cynical casino. But Lagerfeld was typically pointed when he broke down the metaphor's relevance to his own role in fashion. "I gamble with collections more than ever," he admitted. "I'm always telling myself: 'You can do better. You're lazy. You can make an effort.'" Reflection has been his default position lately. "I never get any satisfaction from what I'm doing," he added. "I do it for the doing, not the having done." But he couldn't resist dismissing his latest exercise in intellectual showmanship as a promotional vehicle for Chanel's fine jewelry. His vedettes wore diamond stars and comets and bows on their customized creations. "It was a dream," Chaplin rhapsodized. The 70-year-old said she mostly plays "grannies in horror movies" now. Lagerfeld allowed her to be a glamorous granny today.
