Paris Fashion Week came to close on Tuesday night, with glitzy shows from Miu Miu and YSL.
However at the end of last week, many fashionistas were left stranded outside St Pancras International station reciting the perennial line delivered by Miranda Priestly, played by Meryl Streep, in The Devil Wears Prada: “Call Donatella. Get her jet!”
On Friday March 7, all 32 trains scheduled to run between London and Paris were cancelled after an "excessively dangerous" unexploded Second World War bomb was discovered near the Gare du Nord. They missed Sarah Burton’s creative debut at Givenchy (the hottest ticket this season) but were determined to make it to Victoria Beckham’s show that evening.
Many did, thanks to an “emergency” 16:30 “fashion jet” — a Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner, complete with the First Class booths usually reserved for long-haul international flights — laid on by British Airways. “Our teams worked hard to put on an additional flight and larger aircraft to help as many people travel to and from Paris as possible,” says a spokesperson for BA.
“It really was the fashion jet,” said one traveler. “A ginormous jet — 45 minutes in First Class was fabulous. It was the quickest flight ever. The staff said as soon as we reach altitude we have to come back down.”
They continued: “Everyone was there — from designer S.S. Daley to stylists, it was the fashion plane, we all knew each other. Some people were still raging, but I thought it was quite funny.”
BA says their Boeing 787-9 is “a mid-size, dual aisle, twin engine jet and Boeing’s most fuel efficient aircraft to date — 20 per cent more fuel efficient than the similar sized commercial jets it is designed to replace.”
But it was the First Class cabin that those accustomed to the front row had their eye on. “The Boeing 787-9 features an evolution of our First cabin, with just eight seats compared to the usual 14, increased range and is 20 feet longer and four inches taller than the 787-8.”
At Victoria Beckham’s show, which was scheduled to begin at 20:00 and as usual was attended by a medley of her sons, their girlfriends, and supportive husband David, the majority of the fashion pack made it. Even if some were spotted dragging their suitcases to the entrance.
