Celine has named Michael Rider its new artistic director, succeeding Hedi Slimane. He starts in early 2025.
WWD reported on April 24 that Celine was girding for a possible Slimane exit and had lined up a potential successor in Rider, creative director at Polo Ralph Lauren.
It marks a return to the French house for Rider, who logged a decade as Celine’s design director of ready-to-wear from 2008 to 2018, working under then-creative director Phoebe Philo.
A graduate of Brown University in Rhode Island, Rider also worked as a senior designer at Balenciaga from 2004 to 2008, according to his LinkedIn profile.
Celine parent LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton declared Rider’s arrival several hours after announcing that Celine and Slimane were parting ways after a fruitful, seven-year collaboration.
In a release, LVMH said Rider would have “the entire creative responsibility of all Celine collections, from womenswear, menswear, leather goods and accessories to couture.”
“I am delighted to welcome Michael back to Celine, a maison that he knows intimately,” commented Severine Merle, chief executive officer Celine. “Michael’s vision, creative talent, together with his genuine nature and strong connection to Celine’s heritage, make him a natural choice to continue to build a long-lasting success for the maison.”
For his part, Rider said: “Celine is a maison with values very close to my heart and a beautiful heritage to build on. I am honored to come back and shape the future of the maison together with the Celine team.”
It is understood LVMH wishes to build on Celine’s current momentum, and not stray too far from the winning template Slimane had forged, riffing on French bourgeois codes with sly winks to grunge and other alternative music scenes.
According to sources, Celine ranks alongside Loewe as one of the fastest-growing brands at LVMH Fashion Group, with revenues in the ballpark of 2.5 billion euros, making it bigger than Roman house Fendi.
The hire thrusts another prominent studio talent into a plum, high-profile role. In the past, LVMH has tended to favor marquee talents like Slimane and Philo, among the most bankable designers of their generation.
“Under his creative and artistic direction, Celine has experienced exceptional growth and established itself as an iconic French couture house,” LVMH said of Slimane.
“The holistic vision of Hedi Slimane, his exigence and rigor have made it possible to redefine the codes of Celine whilst reaffirming its feminine and Parisian roots,” the French luxury group said in a statement. “He has also remarkably enriched new territories for the maison such as the men’s silhouette, couture and haute parfumerie. The extraordinary journey taken together over the last seven years has made Celine a house with a formidable foundation for the future.”
It is understood Rider has already relocated to Paris, but has kept a low profile. He could not immediately be reached for comment.
Slimane’s departure came only three days after he unveiled his spring 2025 women’s collection for Celine via a 10-minute film broadcast on the brand’s website and social channels.
It reaffirmed his reputation as a formidable fashion designer, filmmaker and dream weaver, able to crystalize a style and present idealized imagery that’s compelling and precise.
His women’s collection film brought to vivid life the late French singers and fashion icons Juliette Gréco and Françoise Hardy via bushy bangs, heavy eyeliner, baby-doll dresses and shapely tuxedos.
Meanwhile, his latest cardigan jackets, tweed suits, long necklaces and skirts that cover the knee further fanned a widespread industry conviction that Slimane has the chops, aesthetic and the vision to tackle Chanel, which is currently searching for Virginie Viard’s successor.
Chanel executives told WWD this week it is not yet ready to reveal its next creative leader — and that it’s not necessarily looking for a big-name designer.
A climate of creative uncertainty and upheaval hangs over the industry, currently grappling with a slowdown in luxury consumption and consumer caution.
The employment contracts of John Galliano at Maison Margiela, Jonathan Anderson at Loewe and Lucie and Luke Meier at Jil Sander are coming to term before the end of the year or in early 2025, according to market sources. There are also creative vacancies at Dries Van Noten, Alberta Ferretti, Jean Paul Gaultier and Y/Project, as reported.
Slimane cemented his reputation — and influenced men’s tailoring for more than a decade — as the designer of Dior Homme between 2000 and 2007. He went on to reinvent and ignite the Kering-owned house of Yves Saint Laurent, which he rechristened Saint Laurent, between 2012 and 2016 — all the while maintaining a close rapport with the Arnault family, which controls LVMH and Dior.
His next move could not immediately be learned. To be sure, he has a track record of revving up a brand and then leaving at the height of its success.
In between, he has also taken long sabbaticals to pursue his photography and art.
When Slimane took over the design reins of Celine, with a mandate to expand the heritage brand into menswear, couture and fragrance, he took a different tack from its previous creative leader, English designer Philo.
“I am enchanted, what a great choice,” Karl Lagerfeld, one of Slimane’s most enthusiastic fans, told WWD at the time of his appointment. “It will be great.”
Slimane immediately brought a blast of cool and youth to Celine, signing up Lalisa Manobal from Blackpink and conscripting her to walk in one of his collection films during the coronavirus pandemic.
When she attended Slimane’s spring 2023 men’s show for Celine along with BTS member Kim Tae-hyung, better known as V, and his bestie, actor Park Bo-gum, pandemonium ensued.
After a few aesthetic tweaks, and after Slimane unearthed the Triomphe logo, Celine took off like a rocket, synonymous with cool, French-girl style with a bourgeois twist.
He meticulously built Celine into a complete universe, adding stationery, headphones, pet accessories, other lifestyle products and Celine Beauté, the first cosmetics line in the house’s history. Lipsticks were added recently and an eyeliner is out next.
The beauty line dovetailed from Slimane’s launch of the Celine haute parfumerie collection, which debuted in 2019.
However, it is understood relations between Slimane and LVMH management have grown increasingly strained.
Still, it seems Slimane worked diligently until the end of his contract, last week releasing a 445-page hardcover book titled “Celine Art Project,” which details the 250 site-specific artworks Slimane curated for the brand’s flagships around the world.