Paris Fashion Week meets Olympics prep: The complete survival guide

Pagès ponders whether fashion week visitors will be best advised to stick to room service, harkening back to the pandemic days. Also reminiscent of the pandemic is the return of QR codes for pedestrians, bikes and cars expecting to enter a so-called grey zone along the Seine, where the opening ceremony will be held. Codes will be requested from 18 to 26 July.

Don’t expect the weather to make life easier. Average rainfall this June has already been exceptionally high. Rising designer Jeanne Friot is staging her show on the rooftop of Duperré School of Applied Arts in Le Marais. “Umbrellas may be a necessity,” she suggests. Friot is less fazed by the impact of the Olympics. “I don’t want to jinx it but it was much smoother than we expected, apart from filing papers for the show at the police préfécture. I wasn’t sure about staging a show before the Olympics, I wondered if buyers and editors would come to Paris — and it turns out that a number of Japanese and Korean buyers aren’t coming — but I thought it was more important than ever to show, given the economic climate. A number of young fashion labels have shut down in recent months. This is worrying.”

Meanwhile, the French political situation is complex, with a turn to the far right anticipated in the forthcoming elections. At a demonstration scheduled for 22 June, many are expected to protest against the rise of Marine Le Pen’s National Rally party. Tens of thousands have already demonstrated across the country.

Getting around Paris

How to navigate Paris this season? Just this once, well-heeled editors and buyers will probably take the metro en masse. The best bet is investing in sneakers and a Navigo pass for public transport (it’s €30.75 for a week’s worth of rides). Avoid the Concorde and Tuileries metro stations though; they’re closed even for changing between lines. Cars provided by the Fédération de la Haute Couture et de la Mode (FHCM), French fashion’s governing body, will be equipped with a Navigo pass for those stuck in traffic and looking to switch to the metro.

Vogue Business’s Luke Leitch, a frequenter of the Paris shows, favours Lime, the rental e-bike service. But he will find it hard to bike from the Left Bank to the Right Bank this season, because the Place de la Concorde, Pont Alexandre III and Esplanade des Invalides will all be closed. (Couture visitors should note that Schiaparelli has shifted for AW24 from Petit Palais to Hôtel Salomon de Rothschild — and Chanel is not returning to the Grand Palais just yet.)