For the first time in its history, Chanel has become a sponsor of a sporting event, the famous Boat Race between Cambridge and Oxford.
That’s quite a surprise! It was in fact the culmination of an idea we’d been nurturing for a number of years, since we’ve been looking for a project with which to associate our Manufacture J12 watch through serving as official timekeeper. While the Boat Race has all the hallmarks of a performance-based sporting event, it offers even more by staging an encounter between institutions such as the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge – among the oldest and most prestigious in the world – and the Maison Chanel whose British roots go back almost a century. Gabrielle Chanel’s history is deeply linked to England, which she visited many times from the 1920s onwards. The first meeting with the organizing committee took place on 10 June – the same date as the first Boat Race held almost two centuries ago. It all happened very quickly, as we shared the same vision and respect for our respective entities. I joked that 40 years from now, 10 June will be remembered as the day Chanel and The Boat Race created this partnership, but I actually believe it! Between and then, we will of course be ramping up the partnership. In 2025, the Chanel J12 Boat Race will take place the week after Watches and Wonders and our presence will remain discreet, but the 2027 edition will mark the centenary of the world’s oldest women’s competition and 2029 will celebrate the event’s bicentenary. We plan to create a trophy for both events.
Given that Gabrielle Chanel designed the famous marinières (striped sailor’s tops) and loved yachting, can we expect other initiatives in the nautical world?
Sport was part and parcel of the life of Gabrielle Chanel, to whom we owe the invention of sportswear in the years 1910-20. When you look at her creations from that era, they remain absolutely modern in materials, cuts and usage, because they were cut to enable freedom of movement, especially for women. The J12 Boat Race is a very important project, which we’ll be pursuing over the long term and we’re not looking for any others at the moment.
At the Watch of the Year awards in Paris this fall, the public showed its appreciation of the J12 Couture which won the Ladies’ Watch prize. Was that a surprise too?
It was a wonderful surprise, as well as a reward for the magnificent work of Arnaud Chastaingt and Chanel’s watch design studio. Even though we are relative newcomers to watchmaking, since our activity in this field dates back to 1987 with the Première watch, we have doubtless launched more creations than anyone else on the women’s market, because the feminine universe is really part of the Chanel DNA. The Couture O’Clock collection launched at Watches and Wonders is one of our strongest, and we are very grateful to the public for this award, one that is becoming increasingly influential.
The J12 will celebrate its quarter-century in 2025, what can be said about that at this stage?
Celebrating the 25th anniversary of the J12 is no mean feat, because a quarter of a century for a collection is significant. The J12 is not only now well-established, it’s iconic. It’s now time for it to reach a new milestone. We’ll be celebrating this anniversary at Watches and Wonders by presenting a new J12, in a new ceramic and perhaps a new color. It will be available in nine limited-edition models – all collector’s items – featuring a ceramic that required years of R&D. We are delighted that these years of research have come to fruition in time for the 25th anniversary. I should point out that the new model will complement the current J12 but will not replace it.
J12 seems to have gone from strength to strength throughout its history, but do you see any particular turning point?
In my opinion, we can single out four different stages. In 2000, Jacques Helleu, our artistic director at the time, created a watch with an incredible design: the black J12 which met with immediate success and featured a 38mm diameter that established it worldwide as a unisex model. In 2003, the white ceramic version propelled it into another dimension: customers globally appropriated this phenomenon and forged its iconic status. In 2019, Arnaud Chastaingt unveiled a new design, 80 % modified, that refined and modernized it, while equipping it with the Kenissi Manufacture caliber. I think the J12 can be likened to the Porsche 911. I wasn’t entirely at ease with the ‘engine’ of the original model, which was acceptable and high-performance, yet not top-notch in terms of design and production. The partnership with Kenissi enabled us to integrate the best and most reliable movement available into the J12, representing a major turning point for the integrity of the product. The fourth stage is coming in 2025, as what we plan to launch at Watches and Wonders opens up an extremely broad field of possibilities.
You've been head of Chanel Watchmaking & Fine Jewellery since 2016. How has this division changed?
We are building on all the work we've done since 1987, in particular the decision in the 1990s to acquire a Manufacture in La Chaux-de-Fonds in order to position ourselves as a "pure player" in the watch industry. Alongside our expertise in ceramics, we have built up a watchmaking ecosystem that contributes to the creative aspects that may inspire Arnaud Chastaingt, but above all to product integrity. It is in this area that we have accelerated the pace of our development to become as I mentioned a "pure player", while retaining complete creative freedom. Our vertical integration, with a strong focus on ceramics, enables us to create for ourselves – as well as to be a partner and supplier to some very fine Maisons. There is also a watchmaking hub that is developing in a totally organic way around brands and people who want to work together and which is driving us forward. For example, our acquisition of a stake in Romain Gauthier in 2011 led its founder to help us with the Monsieur watch in 2016; our investment in Kenissi brought us our in-house caliber in 2018, the same year we became shareholders in F.P Journe; while 2024 saw us acquire a 25% interest in MB&F. The Maisons nonetheless remain independent, nurturing each other and adopting a relatively long-term vision.
How would you sum up the year 2024 for Chanel watches?
First of all, it was a very good year, with some very strong creations. The craziest and most ephemeral was the Couture O'Clock musical automaton created with Reuge, a stunning one-off timepiece that sold out in 20 minutes and vividly illustrates a close encounter between haute couture and haute horlogerie. Radically different yet equally atypical and linked to the world of acoustics, the Première Sound would never have made it past a product committee: a watch worn around the neck with headphones! Fortunately, there is no product committee at Chanel and the UFO was born in September. Arnaud Chastaingt and I had been struck during the fashion shows by the models walking the runways wearing headphones. In addition to the technical challenge of working with a partner, this creation united all the codes of the Première watch. What a wild story, created almost in secret – and what a pleasure to see Lana del Rey wearing it during her concert in Paris!
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