If ever there was a way to make a statement, it’s putting your work on the arm of one of the world’s biggest stars. Just as artistic director at Celine, Hedi Slimane, did back in August, gifting his first handbag for the house to Lady Gaga.

You’d think hanging off Gaga, papped beside Mona Lisa at the Louvre, that the bag might have gone unnoticed – maybe to your average person, at least. But the fashion pack was watching. This was the first sight of Celine under Slimane, the man who (in)famously dropped the ‘Yves’ from Saint Laurent. And it came, unsurprisingly, sans accent.

Gone is the austere minimalism of Celine under Phoebe Philo.

instagramView full post on Instagram

Slimane has used Le 16, named after the label’s atelier address in Paris, to establish the codes central to his own tenure. The bag embodies the classicism expected of a storied Parisian house and speaks to SS19’s general swing towards ‘subversive’ conservatism. That means quintessentially ‘ladylike’ styles reimagined through a Hitchcockian lens – you're presented with classics made contemporary, made a little darker (made for Slimane’s rock’n’roll muse?).

Despite the bag being made to sit elegantly in the crook of ‘one’s’ arm, Slimane intends to bring a modernity to the house by ditching seasonal drops in favour of monthly ones.

And yes, you’ll be able to purchase his Celine online. In fact, Le 16 hits the site today, four months before SS19 ready-to-wear (leather goods are worth 15.5 billion Euros to the label's parent group, LVMH, so no wonder they’re hitting shelves early).

It’s a volte face for a house renowned for its reluctance to engage with digital. But times change, and Celine, with new bags, menswear, couture, and a fragrance to come, will only grow more present.

Le 16, along with the cross-body Triomphe and the quilted C, is the first of many styles set to redefine the house. One thing we can be sure of based on the names, distinctively bourgeois styles and ready-to-wear Breton, is that this will be a fundamentally French chapter.

And that Slimane, wherever he goes, always leaves an indelible (likely Chelsea booted) footprint.