Chanel - Chanel Color Anima

Campaign Date: 2023

Amplify + Chanel celebrate the brand’s legacy of colours through edu-culture and collective creativity...

Challenge

Chanel found itself amidst a rapidly evolving beauty landscape with the beauty industry experiencing substantial growth. The brand needed to adapt to the changing preferences of beauty experts and consumers who were increasingly prioritising self-exploration over perfection. This shift was driven by the pandemic and amplified by social media, creating a challenge for heritage beauty brands like Chanel to connect with their audience in new ways. To solidify their place in the future of beauty, It was time for Chanel to break free from their status quo and put self-expression at the forefront of their brand experiences.

Insight + Strategy

In the context of a rapidly evolving beauty industry, our strategic approach aimed to disrupt the luxury beauty space with the Color Anima event. We recognised the power of culture as a creative driver to propel Chanel into the future of beauty. Our primary focus was on creating an exceptional guest experience, one that was visually striking, artistically creative, format-breaking, and elevated, designed to detach guests from their daily lives and immerse them in the unique world of Chanel.

To achieve this, we harnessed the diverse stories of the COMETES COLLECTIVE to elevate the beauty conversation, transform Chanel's heritage reputation to resonate with a new generation of beauty enthusiasts and enhance the Color Anima experience. This wasn't limited to just in-person attendees; we extended our reach to the wider beauty community online through social media.

Our approach was designed to engage the Chanel community through both physical and digital experiences, allowing them to explore their inner muses and embrace creative freedom. We recognised the importance of social engagement and leveraged it to amplify the event's impact.

Additionally, our strategy involved collaborating with emerging creative talent, further reinforcing Chanel's authority in beauty for a new generation. By aligning with fresh voices and perspectives, we aimed to generate excitement around Chanel's new collective and ensure the brand remained at the forefront of the ever-evolving beauty industry.

Solution

CHANEL Color Anima

An exclusive CHANEL event inviting influencers and makeup artists to experience Color Anima.

Through interactive moments, thought leadership, and immersive experiences, we created an event that told the story of CHANEL’s plural vision of beauty, powered by colour. The event drove momentum for their new collective of makeup artists, the Cometes Collective, illustrating how the brand is shaping the conversation and culture around beauty.

We blurred the lines between channels by seamlessly integrating physical and digital experiences, allowing for a more inclusive and global reach. We broke the format of traditional events, challenging guests to see the world differently, encouraging thought-provoking discussions, and opening up spaces for self-expression.

Taking over the renowned Villa Navarra, home to genuine artworks by the likes of Keith Haring and Basquiat, the guests took part in three chapters of Color Anima. As they arrived, a prologue moment welcomed the guests outside and through the entrance of the Villa, introducing them to the Color Anima world. They were then guided to the first programme of the event: the Roundtable.

Roundtable and Objects of Inspiration

Hearing from experts on colour, guests learned about ‘colour as an idea’ through the iconic colours at CHANEL. They also heard from the Cometes Collective on their approaches to colour in their creations, and encountered a selection of ‘Objects of Inspiration’ curated by the Cometes. These were presented as an exhibition outside the Roundtable space for guests to explore in their own time.Insight + Strategy

Feel Color Anima: Immersive Experiences

Following lunch, the guests were invited to ‘feel’ CHANEL colours through four immersive, multisensory installations, which served as provocations to think about the experience of colour beyond the visual. Offering four ‘lenses of perception’ to interpret the core CHANEL colour palette, the experience aimed to help guests tune in with their raw, emotional experience of colour. Each room posed a question related to the lenses of perception, designed to help guests think deeply about colour.

Outside the gallery, we placed surrealist monoliths inspired by CHANEL packaging that represented the five colours. Red Anima featured some interactive pillars that spoke to ‘Colour in Senses’ through a variety of textures, shades of red, and a sound experience. Black and White Anima presented the idea of ‘Colour in Motion’ – how contrast and contours interact with bodies in motion, using immersive projection and soundscape. Gold Anima spoke to ‘Colour in Radiance’, our elemental inner light that radiates from within, as a golden structure made of delicate chains with a glowing orb in the centre. Finally, Beige Anima made direct references to Gabrielle Chanel’s inspiration for Beige in the French countryside, drawing parallels between the infinite spectrum of nuanced shades in nature, and the kaleidoscopic, fluid nature of our dimensions as ‘Colour in Reflection’. The installation created a spatial collage of the guests, featuring an octagonal pod interlacing mirrors with moving image of natural textures, clad in raw, natural materials on the exterior.

Discover Your Color Anima: Makeup and Creative Workshops

In the final chapter, guests were given the opportunity to channel their Color Anima through an act of self-expression, either at the Makeup Atelier or the Collective Collage Workshop. The Makeup Atelier provided the option to use ProCreate on an iPad as well as a face chart to experiment with the products and create a look inspired by Color Anima. Guests could also sign up prior to the event to take part in a collage workshop, using black-and-white portraits of themselves which were displayed on a large wall alongside other guests, resulting in a collective artwork that evolved over the course of the event.

Color Anima saw the CHANEL event move from being product-centric to narrative-driven, bringing their influence community on the collective journey to empowerment through makeup and beauty.