This documentary about the legendary Parisian store Colette gives an account of the last months before the store closure in the eyes of the founders, the employees and the fans (incl. the likes of Kanye West and Pharrell).
The beginning is slightly awkward. Virgil Abloh and the like pretend to look through their phones for the exact moment when they found out the store was closing as prompted by the interviewer. They all claim they were devastated. Then Kanye says he used to buy his soap at Colette whenever he was in Paris, and now he needs to shop for it online. You think might all be a superficial and obnoxious hypebeast wet dream.
Hang on though. The film gets better as it starts following the creative force and the power relationship behind the two founders of the store, mother and daughter Colette and Sarah. You learn how much they cared about inclusion (from the diversity of their staff to that of their product price points which brought all kinds of customers into the store), how they gave emerging artists a platform, the long hours and the attention to detail they put into the store even when the closure became imminent.
Overall I loved this and watched it again right after I first finished it. I wish the film had been longer to cover more in detail the collaborations with certain artists and the special events they organized at Colette. Finally, I'm left feeling nostalgic for a place I had sadly never been to or ever got to experience.
The beginning is slightly awkward. Virgil Abloh and the like pretend to look through their phones for the exact moment when they found out the store was closing as prompted by the interviewer. They all claim they were devastated. Then Kanye says he used to buy his soap at Colette whenever he was in Paris, and now he needs to shop for it online. You think might all be a superficial and obnoxious hypebeast wet dream.
Hang on though. The film gets better as it starts following the creative force and the power relationship behind the two founders of the store, mother and daughter Colette and Sarah. You learn how much they cared about inclusion (from the diversity of their staff to that of their product price points which brought all kinds of customers into the store), how they gave emerging artists a platform, the long hours and the attention to detail they put into the store even when the closure became imminent.
Overall I loved this and watched it again right after I first finished it. I wish the film had been longer to cover more in detail the collaborations with certain artists and the special events they organized at Colette. Finally, I'm left feeling nostalgic for a place I had sadly never been to or ever got to experience.
