Close encounters of an Inner Chic kind. I think this when bumping into Sofia Coppola and Cosima, her youngest daughter. All set to cross the grand boulevard, they epitomise Californian calm and cool.
Close encounters of an Inner Chic kind. I think this when bumping into Sofia Coppola and Cosima, her youngest daughter. All set to cross the grand boulevard, they epitomise Californian calm and cool. And of course it’s a balmy afternoon and the dappled light streaming through the trees is perfect. Really, there’s nothing like strolling around Paris and meeting someone unexpectedly. It just adds a delightful element to the day and sets the mind wandering: musing over key moments. In Sofia’s case, we first met at Chanel’s Studio. Having interned there, she returned one afternoon and summed up bubbly, sweet and all excited about acting alongside Andy Garcia. Years later in 2002, we crossed paths after she optioned my mother’s book on Marie Antoinette. Again Chanel but the first Métiers d’Arts show in the couture salon. Sofia’s style was different: subtle and seventies sophisticated, suiting her svelte limbs. Unusual for a young but acknowledged film director. Ever since, there have been a steady flow of other instances; each leaving an indelible imprint. Really, it’s Sofia’s effortless grace that impresses. Black ballerines giving a Degas-like effect to Lanvin’s tulle dress, a silk print dress chosen for supper at Caviar Kaspia, barelegged and lissom on the Argentinean pampas and V-neck grey Shetland sweater worn when directing. Parisians rarely bestow the ‘she’s chic’ prize to Anglo-Saxons but they willingly do so with Sofia. She deserves their praise. Finally, like all true style icons, she forces you to reconsider an old idea. I realise this when clocking her white leather Vuitton bag, casually slung over Cosima’s push chair. Gun cartridge bag-like in form, it’s from Vuitton’s new Cruise collection that Sofia collaborated on. “It’s light,” she says, with one of her mild smiles. Punched with holes, the bag is very light, very white and very right.
Natasha Fraser-Cavassoni is a Paris-based British journalist who covers fashion and lifestyle as well as being the author of Sam Spiegel – The Biography of A Hollywood Legend, Understanding Chic, an essay from the Paris Was Ours anthology and soon-to-be released Chanel book, for Assouline's fashion series.
Robert Beck is former New Yorker currently based in Paris. Also known as C.J. Rabbitt, he is the author and illustrator of several children's books, including The Tale of Rabbitt in Paradis, Un Lapin à Paris and the soon-to-be-published A Bunny in the Ballet.
