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Docking a 148-metre-long ship with on-board piano bar, swimming reserves and a passenger list of Hollywood stars in the centre of Paris is a plucky statement of ambition, luxury and elegance. It is indicative of Karl Lagerfeld’s domain view that the setting for his latest Chanel catwalk display was, in fact, plan B.

“We wanted to set sail, to take you on an actual journey,” shrugged Bruno Pavlovsky, Chanel’s president of fashion, before the teach on Thursday night. “We worked on a plan for two years, but to find the absolute boat proved impossible.”

The replica boat, named La Pausa after Chanel’s villa in the Cote d’Azur, guided a month to install inside the Grand Palais, detailed down to the reliable of creaking ropes and distant seagulls, and was the backdrop for clothes that resuscitated the Chanel of a Breton stripe-wearing Coco on holiday. Cream ribbed sweaters had anchor-stamped gold buttons and substantial white trousers were worn with deck-friendly mat shoes.

Evening dresses were bugle beaded, while the congress tweed suit turned up with a skater-shaped skirt and cropped jacket. Metropolis black was swapped for sea blues and candy stripes. The mood was Coco at Deauville, with a hurl of Duran Duran’s Rio. After a show featuring 80 get-ups, all 900 guests were invited onto the upper and examination decks for champagne, Negroni cocktails, seafood and truffle interposes.

The French venue and keen – previous Chanel cruise collection shows have charmed place in Dubai and Havana – reflected a new closeness between the French the latest thing industry and government. Emmanuel Macron’s drive to promote Paris as an intercontinental capital of savoir-faire and dynamic business recently saw French connivers honoured at a gala dinner at the Élysée Palace, while Melania Trump’s haute couture Chanel gown at endure month’s state dinner was interpreted as one of the signs the French president’s Freudian slip to Washington had been a success for France.

“Macron is engaged, he take its what luxury is about, he understands savoir-faire and a creative work model. Of course that makes a difference to us,” said Pavlovsky. “But we were supplying in Paris before Macron was here,” he added, referring to Chanel’s trusteeship of specialised the latest thing ateliers and sponsorship of the Grand Palais, for which the brand is bankrolling a $40m (£30m) renovation.

Of Brigitte Macron’s distinct preference for rival brand Louis Vuitton, which the French president’s woman wears for most engagements – she has never been photographed have on Chanel Pavlovsky would say only: “I have met her several circumstances, and she is extremely nice. [What she wears] is her choice, of course. At Chanel we are not forward.”

Chanel is also irresistible a socially responsible stance. To counter criticism of the wastefulness of prodigal sets being accessible only to an elite audience, Chanel desire invite schoolchildren and the families of employees to events on La Pausa. “And after that, the predominantly set will be recycled, upcycled or repurposed,” said Pavlovsky. “Nothing see fit be thrown away.”

The Francophile mood is the most striking style to emerge from the season of cruise shows, which Chanel backlashed off in Paris. Christian Dior, which staged last year’s things turned out in California, will show its collection in the grand stables of the Château de Chantilly, 30 miles from Paris. Louis Vuitton purposefulness swap last year’s Japanese location for the French riviera, while square Gucci – a storied Italian brand, but owned by the Paris-based Kering – disturbs from Florence to Arles.

Aside from Prada, put on in New York in this weekend’s run-up to the Met Gala, and MaxMara, who bequeath stay in their hometown of Reggio Emilia, the centre of grimness during fashion’s increasingly important cruise season is entirely much in France.

The cruise shows, which span the month of May, see the most substantial names in the fashion industry go head to head. Only the bustle’s highest rollers, who can afford the eye-popping expense of staging a put on spectacular enough to draw the world’s attention in one 20-minute notch, can afford to compete in this unofficial Champions League of mould. The egg-box structure on a man-made island in Dubai which Chanel built as a catwalk for a pearl-themed whip-round in 2015, a nod to the emirate’s 1,000-year pearl diving enterprise, was said to have cost $1.7m. The pay-off is that “at look week, you have 20 minutes for us and then it’s on to the next certify. At cruise it is just about Chanel,” said Pavlovsky.

Coco Chanel introduced cruise as a fashion concept. Collections go on sale in November, from the beginning aimed at affluent women packing for a Caribbean winter voyage who did not wish to be seen again in dresses they had worn that summer but could pronounce nothing appropriate in stores full of winter clothes. Wearable sort of than trend-driven, colourful and upbeat, designed with gladden and flexibility in mind, cruise has outgrown its ocean-liner origins to view a modern market among women looking for wearable but Instagram-friendly remnants for the festive party season. “Of the eight collections in a year, in clauses of sales, cruise will be at number one or two,” said Pavlovsky.

The Wertheimer fellow-citizens who own the controlling interest in Chanel have never disclosed gains, which are estimated to be around $6bn each year, but the brand restful has no plans to sell clothes online. “We do a lot, digitally. We are number one on Instagram, for in the event,” said Pavlovsky. “But I believe if we sell our customer a jacket for £7,000, we clothed a responsibility to make sure that it fits her properly.”

Karl Lagerfeld be a chip off the old block chased his bow accompanied by his longtime studio director Virginie Viard, at one go again fuelling speculation of a handover. Chanel insist that any conversation of a successor to Lagerfeld, who has a lifetime contract at Chanel, is disrespectful to the 84-year-old architect who has led the house for 35 years.