MILAN — Moncler is zeroing in on its link with the mountains and heading to the tony Swiss ski destination of Saint Moritz with a show dedicated to its Grenoble division.
The luxury brand has earmarked Feb. 3 for a runway event and brand experience amid the imposing Swiss Alps. The exact location and timing for the show were not disclosed.
“The experience will embody the duality at the core of Moncler Grenoble: a coming together of high performance and high style,” the company said in a statement, which described the event as an “outdoor experience befitting the DNA of the brand’s quintessential mountain line.”
The announcement reflects Moncler’s broader push toward its mountain-geared Grenoble division.
In 2022 Moncler rebooted Grenoble as the brand’s “high performance” component, flanked by the fashion-forward Moncler Genius and lifestyle Moncler Collection. Late last year, as reported, it opened the first flagship store globally dedicated to the label in Saint Moritz, a mountaintop resort said to be among the favorite destinations of Moncler’s chairman and chief executive officer Remo Ruffini.
That opening came with the release of a Grenoble dedicated ad campaign featuring marquee athletes Xuetong Cai, Perrine Laffont, Richard Permin and Shaun White, all Moncler Grenoble ambassadors, lensed by Jamie Hawkesworth. Imagery was flanked by a short movie by Benn Northover.
Moncler Grenoble owes its name to the city that hosted the Olympic Games in 1968, when the brand was the French national ski team’s official supplier.
The first Grenoble collection was presented in New York in January 2010 during the city’s fashion week. The last runway event held by the brand was in February 2017, a winter ball staged at Manhattan’s Hammerstein Ballroom during New York Fashion Week.
To be sure, Moncler is not new to embracing the roving format to unveil its collections.
Last February it decamped to London Fashion Week for the yearly Moncler Genius show-cum-event, drawing 10,000 guests including Leonardo DiCaprio, Justin and Hailey Bieber, Serena Williams and FKA Twigs to the exhibition center Olympia London. The live event was centered around “The Art of Genius,” allowing the nine collaborators — Alicia Keys, Pharrell Williams, Mercedes-Benz, Palm Angels, Frgmt, Adidas Originals, Salehe Bembury, Roc Nation and Rick Owens — to bring their own vision to Moncler.
Moncler’s move is in sync with fashion and luxury brands increasingly flocking to the mountains and betting on skiwear, a burgeoning category in their lifestyle offerings. This winter brands ranging from Balenciaga and Balmain to Chanel and Louis Vuitton have all dropped skiwear collections and many more, including Fendi, Brunello Cucinelli, Bottega Veneta, Paul & Shark, Pollini and Golden Goose, among others, have hosted activations in tony destinations such as Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy; Gstaad, Switzerland; Aspen, and Courchevel, France.