Inside Louis Vuitton’s Soft Power Play With Lisa, Zendaya and Cate Blanchett
Nicolas Ghesquière explored soft power this season with a front row full of strong women.
Blackpink’s Lisa made her way to the front row, seated with LVMH Mo?t Hennessy Louis Vuitton chairman Bernard Arnault. The two shared a hug and the bise greeting and posed for photos together.
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The K-pop star was seated next to Zendaya, Cate Blanchett and French First Lady Brigitte Macron in the front row. The collection may have been dedicated to soft power, but the looks were fierce.
Blanchett was in a white cape top and leather trousers that she had repurposed from a previous look. The longtime Louis Vuitton brand ambassador has made it a mission in her work with the house and creative director Ghesquière to rethink previous looks.
It’s been revolutionary on the red carpet, but shouldn’t be that unusual, she asserted.
“We all do it in our everyday life, and it just seems crazy to me to not treasure these things that are so beautifully constructed,” she said. She’s reworn looks or pieces, such as her jewelry on the Cannes red carpet.
“Actually, it’s been such a relief. It’s been a much more creative way to think,” she said, citing her experience running the Sydney Theater Company, where they introduced environmental parameters for productions and sparked a wave of new ideas.
The Oscar winner added that fashion can play a big role in creating change on many fronts — it is, after all what sets trends.
“If you’re not engaged as a creative entity with the greatest challenges of the day — human displacement, climate change — you’re not relevant. From a creative point of view, you have to be relevant. We’re obsessed with being relevant in this industry,” she said. Both fashion and film are “very slowly realizing” they need to be engaged, especially to the younger generation.
Her 16-year-old son Ignatius steals clothes from her and her husband’s closet, and is “really adamant” about wearing vintage.
It’s also an inherited trait, she joked. “That’s what I learned that from my mother. I stole the bits from her wardrobe from the ’80s. Thank God, because if you keep it long enough, it comes back.”
Blanchett added that she sees hope in a new generation of designers, citing LVMH Prize winner Hodakova as one to watch.
The world, meanwhile, is on witch watch, eagerly anticipating the upcoming “Wicked” film with Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande.
The press tour for the film will be a “crazy, full, big, busy and exciting” world tour of premieres, Erivo revealed. Despite the busy schedule, she’s excited to have the cast back together again.
“I was in massive tears when we wrapped, but I think what is lovely is that we’re still all very much in contact. I see Ari a lot and I speak to Ari every day. We are a family,” she said.
She is in the midst of planning her wardrobe for the tour and while not quite “method dressing,” she is picking from the “palette of Elphaba,” she revealed. That means lots of shades of green.
Book author Gregory Maguire is working on a second installment that dives deeper into the backstory of Elphaba and understanding her villain origin story, laying the foundation for a sequel film.
Jasmine Jobson is continuing her love affair with Louis Vuitton after wearing a gown for her best supporting actress BAFTA win. “It was a pivotal career moment for me, and to be able to be dressed in Louis and look like an absolute queen but still with a little nod toward my tomboy style, was a beautiful experience,” she said.
She has been filming “In the Shadows,” a biopic about Somali-Brit boxer Ramla Ali. She practiced karate when she was younger, but to get in shape for the role she learned boxing and kickboxing. “I had to completely learn a different form of fighting. I had to completely change my physical stance and learn a different craft. I saw a massive change in my body, dramatically, within weeks,” she said about getting in the ring.
Fighting was in the air at the show it seemed, with Chlo? Grace Moretz revealing that she is also working on a boxing project. She’s about to start filming a project about UFC fighting with Lupita Nyong’o.
She defined her suit jacket and shorts outfit as “a little more refined, but a little badass.”
“Badass, that’s my main genre,” she joked, saying it stretched back to the superhero comedy “Kick-Ass” in 2010. She has kept up her training since the film, which she shot when she was just 12. Moretz said she practices MMA fighting, Muay Thai and jiu jitsu.
“I just love playing strong female leads and the diversity of that, and being able to dig into the portrayal of characters that are maybe different than what I’m allowed to do in my day-to-day life,” she said.
She was separated from friend Ho Yeon Jung by the sea of trunks that were set to make up the runway. “Throw me a rope,” she said. “We’re like Romeo and Juliet.” But the two caught up after the show, and joked about learning swear words in French and Korean.
Alicia Vikander recently wrapped “Hope,” which shot in South Korea. It was her fourth time in the country, having had her first festival experience at the Busan Film Festival in 2010, where she “fell in love” with Asian cinema.
Vikander picked up basic Korean during the shoot, and professed admiration for K-pop stars. “I love seeing them perform, and I’ve been very very fortunate to see it up close.”
Another hit to the “soft” power theme was Ana de Armas, who plays an assassin in the upcoming “Ballerina.” She learned martial arts and jiu jitsu for the role, though she prefers gentler activities like swimming, strolling the streets of Paris and, well, breakfast.
“They’re really delicious here, and they feel special,” she said of carb-filled starts to the day.
Devon Ross was fighting off jet lag from her trip from Los Angeles, where the singer is about to start filming “The Deputy,” with William H. Macy, Tiffany Haddish and Julia Fox.
It’s a dramatic “wild adventure” about a policeman, with undertones of humor. “Oh my god, I would love to go shopping in her closet,” she said of Fox. Ross was seated next to NewJeans star Hyein, who bopped her head along to the runway soundtrack.
Rob Lowe was crashing a girls weekend wife Sheryl Berkoff had planned. He got in on the travels on one of his rare breaks from working on three TV shows simultaneously, and ended up in the front row for his very first fashion week.
“I’m taking it all in. I get paid to wear costumes for a living, so I love watching people express themselves through how they dress,” he said.
But he missed “The West Wing” reunion at the White House in mid-September because he was too busy with juggling his many projects. He plans to take a break soon. “When you get an invitation to the White House and you’re busy? I know something’s got to give,” he added.
French actress Noémie Merlant is starring in an updated version of the classic erotic film “Emmanuelle.”
“What was important for me was doing a movie through the female gaze,” she said of working with director Audrey Diwan. “She wanted to explore the feminine pleasure through one particular starting point, which resonates a lot in me.”
More than an erotic film, it’s about the character learning about herself and her desires, which should resonate beyond the film. “Just let it go,” Merlant said. “Let go of all the societal pressures and diktats.”
And that is soft power for a strong woman.
Launch Gallery: Celebrities Front Row at Louis Vuitton Spring 2025 Ready-to-Wear Show Photos
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