Hi, and welcome back to Line Sheet. Today, Rachel Strugatz
initiates her coverage of Chanel Beauty—the engine that has kept the Wertheimer family’s crown jewel running for more than a century. I was curious to know how Matthieu Blazy’s arrival at the company was impacting other parts of the business, and Rachel has the answers you won’t find anywhere else.
Up top, my thoughts on Dior’s refined red carpet strategy and the growing anti-fashion sourced sentiment. Plus, Malique
Morris is here to look at how the current sports frenzies—from the World Cup to the Knicks—are faring on the merch front.
Also mentioned in this issue: A$AP Rocky, Gisele, Brian Molloy, Cécile Paravina, Disclosure Day, Greta Lee, Jacob Elordi, Jason Bolden, Jonathan Anderson, black nail polish, Josh
O’Connor, Karl-Anthony Towns, Lucia Pica, Madison Square Garden, Michael Bargo, Peter Philips, Timothée Chalamet, Willy Chavarria, and more.
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Three Things You Should Know…
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- Josh
O’Connor, Greta Lee, and Dior’s red carpet reclamation: Around the time of the Oscars, it became clear that Dior’s red carpet department had snapped into shape. The garments still looked as if they were designed by Jonathan Anderson, but they were also ultra polished and perfect-fitting, with nary a wrinkle in sight. It’s a far cry from last year’s Venice Film Festival—back when we didn’t know what to think about Anderson’s red carpet strategy.
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the past couple of weeks, however, I’ve noticed an even larger change in the midst of Josh O’Connor’s Disclosure Day press tour. Sure, he has a new stylist (Jason Bolden) who is mixing Dior with other brands (Lemaire, etcetera) and generally giving O’Connor a more polished, movie star look. But the pieces are also
really good. Similarly, Greta Lee looked amazing in Dior couture at a Toy Story 5 premiere, and it wasn’t just because she’s in the running for Hottest Woman Alive. Notably, O’Connor and Lee are both actually Anderson’s friends, and have been with him since the early days of the Loewe journey. The lessons are clear: Stick with the people who inspire you, ascend together, and share in the success once everyone has made a lot of money. Long-term, this is the kind
of celebrity strategy that sticks.
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- The
personal shoppers are driving the Chanel heads crazy: One of the most interesting things about the current luxury market, which is so reliant on V.I.C.s, is its impact on the cottage industry of personal shoppers and sourcers who nab hot-ticket items and essentially resell them—or at least facilitate their sale—for a fee to customers who don’t have time for research or to join waitlists. “No real client will stand in line for five hours for a bag,” one V.I.C. told
me.
Of course, personal shoppers with a good reputation are able to reserve several items at a time during the preorder period, tying up inventory that would otherwise be fair game. This is frustrating for some V.I.C.s, who are desperate for the limited quantity of Blazy-era products on the market. The good news for all, though, is that there is more product hitting department store kiosks. Also, I recommend visiting stores in places like Lisbon and Venice, which tend to be less picked
over than Paris, Los Angeles, and London.
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Malique Morris
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- Knicks in 6!:
Here in New York, Knicks fans are forming lines for merch near Madison Square Garden ahead of tonight’s Game 4 of the NBA Finals. And it’s not just hardcore fans: After the Knicks stole the first two games in San Antonio, the city became awash in mismatched blue and orange socks, or Knicks-themed graphic tees featuring courtside denizen Timothée Chalamet as
his Dune character, Paul Atreides. Indeed, it’s gotten so frenzied that a Dick’s employee laughed at one of my editors when he asked for center-forward (and The Devil Wears Prada 2 star) Karl-Anthony Towns’s jersey. I’d expect nothing less from the fans of a team that hasn’t been in the Finals since 1999.
Retailers across the city are taking part in the action. According to my sporty friends, vintage shops and street vendors are seeing plenty of foot
traffic. But sportswear giants—which are all betting on sports as lifestyle products continue to underperform—are getting in on this, too. Nike, the official outfitter for the NBA since 2015, launched a Knicks-colored Air Force 1 last month, which quickly sold out and is currently selling for double the original price on resale. Adidas, which had the NBA contract before Nike, is selling blue and orange New York–themed tees and sweatpants.
Unsurprisingly, both brands are placing
even larger bets on the World Cup, a more global event. Adidas’s line of merch for the Mexican national team, with Mexican American designer Willy Chavarria, dropped today. Meanwhile, Nike’s own merch and kits rollout—including a 12-week span of content, events, and collaborations with the likes of Jacquemus and Palace—represents one of its biggest drops ever. It’s another reminder that sports merch is a big opportunity, mostly because that’s just how young people—who
unironically pair Solomons with trousers, and blouses with gym shorts and cowboy boots—dress now. Why not swap one of those items out for the team of the moment?
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And now, a close look at Chanel Beauty…
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Chanel insiders are wondering when—and how—the Matthieu Blazy effect will start to bolster
the brand’s skincare and makeup categories.
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As you know, Chanel has been enjoying a maniacal resurgence ever since Matthieu
Blazy began his tenure as the brand’s artistic director last April. As it’s played out, I’ve been wondering how that momentum will (or will not) impact the $6 billion Chanel Beauty division. Chanel hasn’t really been a meaningful player in mainstream beauty culture since 2006, when it introduced black nail polish. A person close to the company told me that, obviously, they were optimistic about a Blazy “halo” effect—hopeful that beauty products, such as the $35 Le
Vernis nail polish, will eventually lead someone to spend five figures on a handbag down the line.
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I spoke with numerous insiders, and no one expected Blazy to seriously alter the brand’s minimal
black-and-white beauty packaging. (He shouldn’t!) Instead, they said his biggest impact might be felt on the marketing side, from the look and feel of the campaigns to the various talent partnerships. “Think about all the ambassadors he’s brought on in such a short period of time,” such as A$AP Rocky, said a person familiar with the fragrance business.
In any case, there’s a lot of potential room to grow the beauty division—despite the fact that the category has driven
around 30 percent of Chanel’s overall sales, give or take, for nearly two decades. In 2025, Chanel’s overall revenue climbed to $19.3 billion—a 2 percent bump from 2024, with operating profits increasing by 5 percent, to $4.7 billion. And obviously, the numbers this year will be even stronger: Chanel’s U.S. revenue is already up more than 25 percent year over year, with every vertical boasting increases, according to a person familiar with the business. (I’m told the East Hampton pop-up did
close to $2 million in sales in its first four days, far surpassing internal expectations.) A thriving Chanel Beauty would not only bolster their position in a competitive luxury landscape, it could arrive at a time when other major players are also stuck in various states of limbo.
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Fragrance, in particular, remains a bright spot for the company. Globally, Chanel is a top two brand in the
category, alongside Dior, and Jacob Elordi’s appointment as the global ambassador for Bleu de Chanel, in April, has been heralded internally as a success. I’m told the metrics surrounding Elordi’s announcement even surpassed the numbers for Timothée Chalamet, who stepped into the same role about three years earlier. “They thought Timothée was going to be a ‘relatable’ version of masculinity, but they hit the jackpot with Jacob,” said a person familiar with the
fragrance business.
Makeup and skincare, however, could use substantial work. While Chanel has some great beauty and skin products, an insider noted that both lack a crucial “storytelling” element—and that Chanel’s skincare challenges, in particular, are significant. The category has become more competitive in the wake of the post-Covid skincare frenzy and influx of great serums and moisturizers across all price points. A person close to the beauty business also acknowledged that Chanel
simply hasn’t “kept up” with “the evolving pace of skincare science and technology.” (In fact, I’m not sure if Chanel ever had real authority in skincare, with the exception of a few products and franchises such as the super-luxe Sublimage range or “La Solution 10.”)
Meanwhile, the makeup category has been hampered by the absence of a dedicated creative director since the 2021 departure of Lucia Pica, who had succeeded the legendary Peter Philips
six years earlier. Instead of replacing Pica, Chanel named a trio of up-and-coming makeup artists, known as the Cometes Collective, in 2024. “I was pretty surprised about how difficult it is to actually develop and create makeup with a lab,” one of the artists, Cécile Paravina, told
WWD at the time of the appointment. “There are so many intricacies to understand, the functionality.” Obviously, that’s something no one wants to hear from a person leading makeup at Chanel. “The collective, so far, hasn’t worked as well as having a single, creative lead,” the person close to the beauty business said.
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For an enlightened perspective on some potential remedies, I asked Alexis
Page for her candid assessment of Chanel Beauty. “It’s very old school,” the vaunted beauty consultant and former product and branding wizard at MAC Cosmetics, Glossier, and Pat McGrath told me (check out her newish Substack, Self Involved). “In the summer, it’s about bronzing, and Chanel gives you one blush duo, one eyeshadow quad, and three lip glosses with a photo of someone
splashing––and it’s the same for fall, spring, and holiday.”
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We agreed that Chanel shouldn’t change the beauty packaging, and that the swiftest way for Blazy to make his
mark in the sector would be to include products in a show. When he sends a pair of seafoam green shoes down the runway, for instance, there should be a seafoam green nail polish that launches in tandem with the collection. Rather than revamping or reformulating makeup, Page told me, Blazy could simply do specialty shade extensions, which “takes zero time, money, and resources.”
Chanel’s beauty hurdles aren’t unique. It’s one of several luxury giants operating a massive, multicategory
beauty division (Dior, Saint Laurent, Gucci, and Armani are others) trying to appeal to ultra-high-net-worth clients and regular beauty shoppers alike—something really only possible with ample fashion crossover. And in recent years, unfortunately, these beauty brands have been caught off guard by new competitors and a revolving swirl of creative directors who are updating house codes at unprecedented speed. Again, Chanel doesn’t need to overhaul things entirely to kick its beauty arm into gear.
The brand, in the short term, would probably benefit from a powerhouse makeup lead, as well as a few products (lip gloss, nail polish) that share similar motifs and go on sale at the same time as future collections.
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What We’re Reading… and
Scrolling…
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Jacob on why shopping for guys in Los Angeles is so fun, from H. Lorenzo to Mohawk General.
Not so much fun for women. Other than Scout, of course. [N.Y. Times]
Michael Bargo is in the running for one of the most influential interior designers of his generation, and his relationship with The Row is only the beginning of it.
[Elle Decor]
R.I.P. to photographer and Helmut Lang muse Elfie Semotan, who died in Austria earlier this week. She’s one of those people who probably influenced you and you don’t even know how much. [Instagram]
Gisele x Brian Molloy… wow. That’s why we love Sara Moonves!!!! [W mag]
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Until tomorrow,
Lauren
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a couple bucks off them.
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