It is the place where Salvador Dali painted The Enigma of Hitler, a haunting landscape featuring a giant telephone receiver that seems to be crying a tear over a cutout picture of the Fuhrer. Conceived in 1939, the work seems to anticipate war. It is also the place where Winston Churchill penned parts of his multi-volume A History of the English-Speaking Peoples, and painted its dappled-light view.
It was the most fabulous rush hour ever: a Chanel-centric subway station, running the 5th Avenue express (of course) and peopled with an 80-odd strong, all-female cast of American archetypes and stock characters, in extraordinary fashion. They represented, simultaneously, a cross-section of New York past and present, contemporary style, and Chanel 's eye-socking mastery of the arts of creation, which is what its annual Métiers d'Art collections are all about.
"We're like, 'Show us a picture of a senior leadership team from Chanel visiting Microsoft'-it is all men in suits," she said.
Footage captured by The Cut after the show sees Pedro and Lux hugging tightly. Margot Robbie, who kept Pedro company during the show, comments in the footage as this happens, "[he's a] very, very proud brother," before adding, "[it] looks like he's tearing up." Speaking to The Cut, Lux described the show as "innovative," something she felt was akin to her. She added: This show brought an energy of change, of hope, of kindness and of openness."
The latest interpretation of the original Bleu, Chanel Bleu de Chanel L'Exclusif is deeply masculine and mysterious, an intoxicating blend of sandalwood with leathery and resinous notes and an amber-woody trail. That makes its muse of women's fragrances incredibly unlikely and intriguing. "The starting point was to bring the Bleu signature to the level of an extrait parfum, to the concentration, the density, the depth that we usually create for women," says Chanel In-House Perfumer Creator Olivier Polge.
Instead, Polge has reimagined a house classic with Bleu De Chanel L'Exclusif - a new take on the original Bleu fragrance, which his father created during his own tenure as the nose of Chanel before Olivier took over. "There is no such thing as a perfect perfume," Polge tells me. "The identity of a perfume is made by the tension."