Update: In a further release from Celine this afternoon, Michael Rider has been named as Hedi Slimane’s successor. He has an impressive CV: beginning his career at Balenciaga under Nicolas Ghesquière, Rider went on to spend a decade working with Phoebe Philo during her tenure at Celine and was most recently creative director of Polo Ralph Lauren.
'I am delighted to welcome Michael back to Celine, a maison that he knows intimately,' says said Severine Merle, CEO of Celine. 'Michael’s vision, creative talent, together with his genuine nature and strong connection to Celine’s heritage make him a natural choice to continue to build a long-lasting success for the maison.' He will begin at the house in early 2025, and will oversee all collections, including womenswear, menswear and couture.
After months of speculation, Hedi Slimane has confirmed he is leaving Celine, the house announced today (2 October 2024). Coming days after revealing his S/S 2025 womenswear collection via a short film, it marks the end of a seven-year tenure in which the designer has reshaped the house with his singular vision, which combines subcultural influences with the heights of Parisian savoir-faire.
‘Under his creative and artistic direction, Celine has experienced exceptional growth and established itself as an iconic French couture house,’ said Celine in a statement. ‘The extraordinary journey taken together over the last seven years has made Celine a house with a formidable foundation for the future.’
Hedi Slimane to leave Celine after seven years as artistic, creative and image director for the French couture house
To herald his arrival at the house in 2018 after the departure of Phoebe Philo, he dropped the acute accent – ‘é’ – from the first ‘e’ in Celine. His tenure has seen the designer achieve both commercial and critical success, establishing a comprehensive Celine wardrobe for men and women that spans clothing, accessories, haute parfumerie and, most recently, beauty, which launched in Harrods earlier this month with a single red lipstick.
Initially showing Celine collections as part of Paris Fashion Week, Slimane has since favoured either off-schedule shows – like a blockbuster A/W 2023 show held in Los Angeles titled ‘The Age of Indieness’, or collection films, which he directs. In keeping with this approach, he also photographs all of the brand’s campaigns.
His collections for the house – which favour riffs on archetypal garments over avant-garde statement – have drawn on Celine’s golden era in the 1960s and 1970s, whereby it was adopted as the uniform of the Parisian bourgeoisie (think: tweed jackets, silk carré scarves, horsebit motifs), though infused with Slimane’s love of rock and roll. Recently, he has drawn inspiration from the indie and electro scenes of the 2000s, when the designer rose to fame during his tenures at Dior Homme and later Saint Laurent. Music has been an intrinsic part of his runway shows, on which he has collaborated with figures from LCD Soundsystem to Suicide.
He also revived the house’s Triomphe logo, which is said to be based on the railings which surround Paris’ Arc de Triomphe and was introduced in the 1970s (so the story goes, house founder Céline Vipiana’s car broke down at the landmark, prompting her to notice the decorative flourish). It now adorns many of Slimane’s designs for the house, including the clasp of the ‘Triomphe’ handbag, sunglasses, jewellery, and Celine’s signature monogrammed canvas. In the brand’s HQ in Paris, they even distribute Triomphe-shaped candy and mints.
The move will of course prompt speculation as to where the designer is heading next – he has been one of the front runners in the conversation as to who will take over Chanel after the departure of Virginie Viard – though as yet the designer has not hinted at his next move.
