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Chanel’s comparable revenue climbed roughly 16 per cent in the first half of 2026, according to a Bloomberg report citing a person familiar with the privately held French house’s finances. Bloomberg’s source pointed to one factor above all others: the arrival of creative director Matthieu Blazy, whose debut collections landed in stores in March.
Blazy joined Chanel after stints that built his reputation among the industry’s most closely watched design talents. His first ready-to-wear collection for the house drew queues outside Chanel boutiques in the weeks following its release, along with unboxing videos customers posted online. The phenomenon picked up its own shorthand: Blazymania.
Chanel’s fashion division, which the source said accounts for around 60 per cent of group revenue, grew broadly in line with the company’s overall sales performance. Watches and fine jewellery did even better, posting growth of about 35 per cent, while beauty, often the most stable and least glamorous part of a luxury conglomerate’s business, still managed an 8 per cent rise.
According to the same source, all regions recorded gains during the period, including China, where luxury spending has been under pressure for the better part of two years, and the Middle East.
Chief financial officer Philippe Blondiaux is separately preparing to hand his duties to Hélène de Tissot, an executive with a background in spirits, by the end of the year.
LVMH, the world’s largest luxury group by revenue, reported first-half revenue of €38.6bn, or roughly $44.5bn, up 2 per cent organically, with organic growth accelerating to 3 per cent in the second quarter. The group’s Fashion & Leather Goods division, home to Louis Vuitton and Dior, returned to growth after seven consecutive quarters of decline. Kering generated €7.2bn, or roughly $8.3bn, in first-half revenue, down 3 per cent on a reported basis but back to 2 per cent comparable growth in the second quarter, with Gucci’s decline narrowing to 2 per cent from 8 per cent the prior quarter.
Hermès posted revenue of €8.2bn, or roughly $9.4bn, up 6 per cent at constant exchange rates, with an operating margin of 41.1 per cent, among the strongest in the sector. Even so, the modest growth at both LVMH and Hermès reportedly failed to convince investors, according to the same reporting.
Brunello Cucinelli was the standout among the disclosed comparisons, up 13.3 per cent. Chanel’s growth arrives on the back of a 2025 in which the company said its annual revenue rose 2 per cent to $19.3bn, itself a recovery after a drop in 2024.
Chanel is due back on the runway at Paris Fashion Week, which runs from September 28 to October 6, for the spring/summer 2027 womenswear season. Chanel remains one of the week’s headline names alongside Dior, Louis Vuitton and Saint Laurent, and the show will mark Blazy’s next mainline ready-to-wear collection since the frenzy that greeted his debut.
That debut came last October, when Blazy showed his first ready-to-wear collection for the house at the Grand Palais, transformed into a planetarium for the occasion with glowing orbs and a star-lit ceiling above the runway. His first haute couture collection followed in January, staged around a set of oversized mushrooms and referencing plumage and birds throughout the garments themselves, according to the show notes.
Most recently, Blazy staged his first Métiers d’art show in New York last month, held inside the city’s subway system. It was Chanel’s first Métiers d’art presentation in New York since Karl Lagerfeld’s final show for the house in 2018.
Not every house is riding the same wave. Capri Holdings, owner of Michael Kors and Jimmy Choo, reported first-quarter fiscal 2027 results this week showing total revenue of $769m, down 3.5 per cent year on year.
Michael Kors revenue fell 7.1 per cent to $590m as the company cited softer EMEA trends and trimmed its full-year outlook to approximately $3.4 bn, while Jimmy Choo revenue rose 10.5 per cent to $179m and swung to a 7.3 per cent operating margin from 2.5 per cent a year earlier, a return to profitability chief executive John Idol had flagged as a priority for the year. Group earnings per share came in at $0.60, ahead of expectations, with the adjusted figure at $0.67.
Ralph Lauren is due to release its first-quarter fiscal 2027 results later today, before the market opens, with analysts expecting revenue of around $1.86 bn and earnings per share of $4.26. The company beat consensus EPS estimates in each of its past three reported quarters.
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