Luck, Snow and Vetiver: How Chanel Sells a State of Mind

Chanel, the Paris house founded by Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel in 1910 and now led in fashion by Matthieu Blazy, has put three quite different things in front of us this month: a gold medal, a snow-covered Christmas film and a woody perfume. They look unrelated. Read side by side, they tell the same story, and it is mostly about belief.

A medal for people who believe in themselves

Start with the jewelry. The CHANEL Fine Jewelry Creation Studio, the house’s in-house jewelers, has added a new piece to Chance de Chanel, a collection of reversible medallions inspired by the talismans Gabrielle Chanel wore. The newest is a Symboles medal in 18-karat yellow gold, natural white mother-of-pearl and diamonds. On the front, four of her favorite emblems appear together in jewelry for the first time: the comet, the camellia, the number 5 and the lion. On the back, the letters of the house name seem to roll across the surface like a bas-relief, thanks to a laser-engraving technique borrowed from watchmaking.

The house’s line is that, for Gabrielle Chanel, luck was not a matter of chance but a state of mind. The collection itself arrived last year in two versions: a Symboles medal in black jade (reported at about €31,000 at launch, with 74 diamonds around the stone) and a Talismans medal with wheat, comet and the number 5 (about €6,800). The white mother-of-pearl version is the third. Chanel has not, as far as I could find, published a price for it.

What makes the design clever is the reverse side. A piece that is meaningful on both faces is a piece you wear for yourself, since the hidden side lies against your skin. It is luxury as private ritual, the opposite of a logo to be photographed.

A getaway with a very large sleigh

Then there is the holiday campaign. “The CHANEL Winter Getaway” stars Margaret Qualley in a short film in which a sleigh quietly fills with gifts bearing the house signature as she travels from Paris toward snowy mountains. The tag is “all roads lead to CHANEL.” The beauty selection includes Paris–St. Moritz, which the house calls the first winter-inspired eau de toilette in its Les Eaux de Chanel collection, and the campaign draws on Gabrielle Chanel’s 1930s winter retreats to St. Moritz.

The same week, the fashion side released Coco Neige 2026/27, its winter-sports capsule under Blazy, with oversized ski jackets, shearling boots and nylon flap bags. If that sounds familiar, it is because Louis Vuitton announced LV Ski this autumn and Moncler has a whole floor of mountain wear on Fifth Avenue. Alpine luxury has become a crowded neighborhood, and Chanel’s answer is to claim it as an episode of its own mythology.

A perfume with roots

Sycomore, in the Les Exclusifs de Chanel range sold only in the house’s boutiques, was created with the perfumers Jacques Polge and Christopher Sheldrake. The new push, under Chanel’s Grand Parfumeur banner for the second half of 2026, casts it as the scent of Mademoiselle’s roots: the heat rising from the ancient volcanic landscape of the Auvergne where, the house says, she grew up, built around the incisive notes of vetiver.

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Between the lines

Mythology is Chanel’s real inventory. The medal, the sleigh and the vetiver are three containers for one asset: the life of Gabrielle Chanel, converted into symbols that can be worn, sprayed and gifted. The lion is her astrological sign, the comet her sense of freedom, St. Moritz her winter, the Auvergne her origin. A founder’s biography is the one thing a competitor cannot imitate.

Luck is an old luxury product, and it travels. In China, Chanel has played on the same instinct: trade coverage reported that pairing its 1957 Extrait with Sycomore and No. 5 is read by some consumers as a recipe for finding a mentor, career success and fortune. Whether or not Coco would approve, she would surely have recognized the logic. Selling comfort about the future is as old as luxury itself.

Scale of ambition, scale of comfort. Interbrand’s 2026 ranking has Chanel at number 24 and rising, in a year when most big fashion names slipped. Brands in that position can afford to tell slow, symbolic stories. A winter film that sells nothing explicitly is a confident luxury.

Mythology is a renewable resource, but not an infinite one. When a house leans on the same handful of symbols (camellia, comet, 5, lion) across jewelry, fragrance, makeup and fashion, the risk is repetition, and the most devoted customers notice first. The test of the Chance de Chanel line will be whether it keeps surprising people or simply adds a new gemstone each year.

Still, there is something agreeable about a house that asks you to believe in your luck and then hands you a medal with a secret on the back. A little superstition, well made, is a very civilised thing.