Charlotte Casiraghi, Grace Kelly's Granddaughter, Named Chanel Brand Ambassador for 2021
Charlotte Casiraghi is Chanel's new ambassador and spokesperson. The Monégasque royal is a natural choice, as a love for fashion runs in the family: Casiraghi's grandmother was Grace Kelly, the actress and style icon-turned-royal, and her mother, Princess Caroline, is a longtime Chanel devotee.
In a video posted on Chanel's Instagram, Casiraghi explains what the new role means to her, and her personal connection to the luxury house. "It’s almost as if I was born with Chanel," she says. "I think of photos of my mom, when she was pregnant with me. Wonderful photos by Karl Lagerfeld, with her wearing Chanel." Indeed, Lagerfeld and Princess Caroline shared a decades-long friendship, and Casiraghi grew up knowing the late designer. Both she and her mother attended Lagerfeld's funeral in February 2019.
Casiraghi noted that shooting the spring-summer 2021 campaign in La Vigie, Lagerfeld's onetime Monaco residence, was particularly special. "I got very emotional doing it at La Vigie," she said, adding that the home was "full of history for me, as it’s Karl’s old house."
So close is Casiraghi's relationship with Chanel, that she wore one of Karl Lagerfeld's last Haute Couture looks to her 2019 royal wedding. "Virginie Viard did the alterations at the fitting, which symbolized Karl passing the baton to Virginie," she says. It was hardly her first time working with Viard, though: "Since I was a little kid, Virginie has always come to see me at fittings," she recalled.
In her new role at the luxury house, Casiraghi will star in Chanel's Spring-Summer 2021 campaign, and also inaugurate a series of talks with celebrated women writers, titled "Literary Rendezvous at Rue Cambon." Casiraghi has a personal passion for literature and feminism—two things that she says Chanel values as well. "Gabrielle Chanel used to receive a lot of writers and artists," she points out. Casiraghi hopes that these salons will demonstrate fashion's ability to "move the culture forwards."
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