Air France Celebrates 90th Anniversary with High Fashion
In OCT, Air France celebrates its 90th anniversary, and to celebrate, it's showcasing a newly-designed original dress collection as part of a Galeries Lafayette window display retracing the company’s history. The display at the iconic Parisian department store runs from 28SEP to 10OCT 2023.
Created from the merger of Air Orient, Air Union, Société Générale de Transports Aériens, the Compagnie Internationale de Navigation Aérienne and Aéropostale, Air France was officially inaugurated on 07OCT 1933. Today, the airline offers its customers close to 1,000 daily flights to 200 destinations with a fleet of more than 240 aircraft.
Air France on display at the Galeries Lafayette
Air France is unveiling a collection of five iconic dresses that interpret the different hallmarks of the airline – aircraft and technology; uniforms and fashion; its posters promoting its network; fine dining and tableware; design and architecture. Each dress is an invitation to explore these themes.
To imagine and design these original dresses, Air France has teamed up with Xavier Ronze, head of the costume design workshops at the Paris Opera Ballet. The costume designer has created these designs from items that have marked the company’s history and contemporary pieces.
Air France has chosen the iconic fashion gallery Galeries Lafayette in Paris to showcase this original dress collection as part of its anniversary celebrations. From 28SEP to 10OCT 2023, it will be retracing its history in the 12 windows of the famous store. The dresses are displayed among a selection of vintage Air France paraphernalia and some of its current offerings.
According to Air France, the showcase is "freely and easily accessible to all French and international visitors."
Inside the Galeries Lafayette, the airline is opening pop-up stores offering a range of items specially created or reissued for this anniversary. Air France is offering a range of affordable and more limited-edition models of old and new aircraft, as well as a collection of comfort kits, postcards, baggage tags and notebooks sporting the 90-year signature. The company is also reissuing items such as its vintage travel bag and iconic posters. A range of items is also available on the airline's website.
Air France is also teaming up with a selection of luxury French brands – Vanessa Bruno, Delsey, Bernardaud, Brun de Vian-Tiran and Le parapluie de Cherbourg - with the collection exclusively available at the Galeries Lafayette.
Air France is also offering visitors the opportunity to purchase original tableware signed by the painter Jean Picart Le Doux and used on board its La Première and Business cabins between 1966 and the 2000s. The proceeds from the sale of these items will be donated to the Air France Foundation, which has been committed to supporting children around the world for 30 years.
Air France fashion shows at Galeries Lafayette Paris Haussmann
Throughout this anniversary period, Air France is offering visitors the chance to attend real fashion shows together with Galeries Lafayette. Models dressed in the uniforms of pilots, cabin crew, airport staff and mechanics will be on show in a dedicated area of the store to retrace the company's uniform heritage, past and present. From the very first "barman" outfits to couture pieces signed by designers such as Christian Dior, Cristóbal, Balenciaga and Christian Lacroix.
