Paris diary...

A brief, yet magical trip to Paris on Tuesday for the Chanel spring/summer 2012 show, which I loved. (Both the collection, and Paris.) Firstly, apologies for the dismal qualities of the pictures, which do no justice to the glorious scenes I saw; but I thought better to have snapshots than nothing at all. (For more professional pictures, look at style.com). This is what I loved most:
1. The pearls in the Chanel show; taken back to their underwater origins, as shimmering leit-motifs in the pale dreamscape of the vast Grand Palais. Pearls are, of course, as essential to the Chanel iconography as the little black dress (indeed, they are the clues to Gabrielle's childhood in the convent at Aubazine, where the nuns' rosaries look like the religious originals of the ropes of pearls that were to become an integral element of her codes as a couturiere). In Lagerfeld's hands, they were scattered through the models' hair, dotted in a graceful line descending from their necks, threaded into belts and buttons, embellishing bags and dresses and cardigans.
2. Place Vendome on a balmy evening in October; the last warm breath of a late Indian summer. Walking across the cobbles to the Ritz, and looking up in the darkness to the suite on the top floor, where Chanel lived in the 1930s -- imagining the nights when she entertained the Duke of Westminster, Winston Churchill, Dali, Picasso, et al. Wondering who slept there now, in the grandeur of the Coco Chanel suite...
3. Following Mademoiselle's footsteps to the discreet lift at the back of the Ritz, beside the Rue Cambon entrance, and up to the sixth floor, to the smaller room where she slept for three decades, until her death in January 1971. Stepping into that room, not for the first time, but perhaps for the last; savouring the moment, wanting it to last forever, yet knowing that nothing lasts, but it can evolve and change into something even more unexpected. Waiting for the next chapter to unfold...