Chanel’s Manchester Show Symbolised How The North of England is Treated

Capitalising off the North’s working-class culture without paying homage to the very class struggle that defines the region is just an insult.

Photo by Steven Roussel on Unsplash

When asked about the Manchester show, Chanel’s President Bruno Pavlovsky said; “The fracture in society between very rich and the mass of people will continue. And those at the top will naturally turn to top-quality products with a real history.” It is this very quote that somehow perfectly sums up the elite’s attitude toward working-class people and working-class regions.

When the Chanel show in Manchester was first announced, there was a mixed response. Rather depressingly, the reactions contained a litany of classist jokes at the expense of the North’s working-class heritage. In fairness, it seemed like a strange place to choose to have a hihg-fashion show because of Manchester’s anti-establishment, political roots. However, it could have been an opportunity to pay homage to the creativity and individualism that the North exceeds at — but it simply did not do this.

Manchester and more generically the North of England is famous worldwide for an array of different reasons. Football, music, and fashion are, still to this day, heavily…