Chanel’s Paraffection wins Rayonnement Français Award 2018

By

Godfrey Deeny

Published
Oct 3, 2018

The extended house of Chanel; a noted chef; a ballet principal and the national football team`s World Cup winning coach, on Tuesday were each awarded one of France´s most prestigious prizes – Le Rayonnement of France.

 
Bruno Pavlovsky, the president of Chanel fashion and accessories divisions, accepted the award for economic influence on behalf of the house`s specialist division, Paraffection. It groups together over a dozen, principally French, luxury suppliers, which provide exceptional skills to the fashion and haute couture industry.
 
“It’s a great honor for me to accept this award for Paraffection. The proof that our métiers and our artisans can participate in the rayonnement of France. Savoir-faire put at the service of creation,” said Pavlovsky, accepting one of ten glass columns at a ceremony inside the French ministry of foreign affairs, the Quai d’Orsay, attended by Anna Wintour, multiple ambassadors, several senators and deputies.

Pavlovsky is also the president of Paraffection, which was created in 1985 to safeguard the supply to Chanel, and multiple couture houses, of the nec plus ultra of refined artisan skills in the production of millinery, gloves, pleating, feathers, pearls and embroidery to name a few.
 
Today no collection designed by Chanel’s creative director Karl Lagerfeld is complete without the skills of Paraffection houses and their unique petits mains, or small hands, which include such marques as Lemarié, Massaro, Montex, Guillet and Cause.
 
Le Rayonnement Français – which roughly translates as French Radiance - is a particularly French concept, which expresses the idea that France has a unique role of creating and exporting its beauty, elegance, panache and skill to the rest of the world. It suggests that France has a special civilizing mission in both the culture and art of living of, well, pretty every other country on the planet. And, after a Paris fashion week bursting with ideas and beauty, it does not seem such an implausible opinion.
 
Among the other winners were Guy Savoy, chef of La Monnaie de Paris, which topped the noted culinary classification La Liste for two consecutive years; and Didier Deschamps and his key staff, who won a Special Jury Prize in recognition of France’s victory in this summer’s World Cup, presented to them by French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian.
 
“France would like to thank you for what you achieved! And for beating a record you may not know. Your final was watched by 56 million Chinese, 21 million Germans and 11 million Italians. So in terms of French Radiance it would be hard to beat that,” said Le Drian, to much applause and laughter.
 
Responding, a modestly toned Deschamps said: “I think that football also has an educational role, and the image I believe that our united team presented during the competition was just as important as its sporting success.”