Designer Karl Lagerfeld was already 18 years into his work at Fendi when he became Chanel's artistic director in 1983. Karl, a documentary directed by Nick Hooker, follows a career that stretched across houses, including Chloé, drawing on the designer’s personal archives. Paramount Pictures has released a new trailer ahead of the film’s digital debut.
Hooker combines archive material with interviews and draws on journalist William Middleton’s 2023 biography, Paradise Now: The Extraordinary Life of Karl Lagerfeld. Middleton knew Lagerfeld personally and is one of the film’s producers, alongside Julia Nottingham and Susan Hootstein.
Interviewees include designer and filmmaker Tom Ford, actors Tilda Swinton, Penélope Cruz and Lily-Rose Depp, Vanessa Paradis, and Inès de la Fressange (her connection to Lagerfeld reaches back to his first years at Chanel: the house selected her as the face of Coco in 1984, and she featured in his first Chanel advertising campaign as a photographer in 1987–88).
The 110-minute documentary screened at the Telluride Film Festival in 2025. Its U.S. digital release is scheduled for October 6.
