“LE RITZ IS MY HOME (Le Ritz, c’est ma maison),” Gabrielle Chanel once said about her favourite sanctuary where she spent her private time. Today in Paris, since early morning, the Ritz hotel suite has been the site of a host of activity. Daylight traces the corners of the ceiling, illuminating the room through half-drawn curtains. The chandelier’s faint sway throws twinkling lights across the room, like a scene in a film. Soon, Jungkook steps into the room—his pace languid and confidently unhurried.

The singer-songwriter has just arrived from Seoul, and he is pushing through his jet lag: He’s the sort of person who—whether it’s a stage, a shoot, or whatever else—dissolves completely into the world that he is immersed in; and he inevitably turns it into something that is distinctively his. With eyes wider and darker than usual, Jungkook slowly takes in the space where Gabrielle Chanel once stayed, noting each detail, one by one. It feels almost like time travel through his eyes.

Inside Jungkook’s Paris Shoot At The Ritz As He Slips Into His Role As Chanel's Beauty Global Ambassador

On the table where his gaze lands are original Chanel perfume bottles from the 1920s to the 1950s, sourced by Chanel’s Global Patrimony team. Memories from half a century ago, sealed inside glass, seem to rise and shimmer just beneath the surface. A global representative, looking on with tenderness, strokes each bottle, explaining the way Gabrielle Chanel chose a scent, her intuition, the air of the era—and how Chanel has, to this day, kept those fragrances breathing in the world.

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Listening to the origins of the scents, Jungkook tilts his head reading the labels and tracing their history. In his eyes is something between curiosity and respect. “I know this scent. I like it.” It’s a short sentence, but the room breaks into wide smiles the moment it lands. Even before being named an ambassador, he had been steadily—and thoughtfully—getting to know Chanel’s fragrances. With no hints, he can identify most of them by name and speak about what a particular scent makes him feel. He shows particular affection for Bleu de Chanel, which he has been wearing for some years now.

Jungkook is a bold artist. Beyond everything he has written into history with BTS, he was the first Asian singer to perform at the opening ceremony of a World Cup hosted overseas, and his first solo single, “Seven (feat. Latto)”, reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and earned a Hot Shot distinction. He has also surpassed 10 billion streams on Spotify, the first Korean solo artist to do so—another proof of his influence and reach.

The way he moves forward—with persistence and passion, talent and sincerity all at once—resembles Chanel’s own trajectory. His music and performance are always precisely calibrated; unnecessary ornament is stripped away, and the result becomes a record.

The approach Gabrielle Chanel chose when creating N°5 in 1921 was similar to the tenet that “elegance that does not overstate elegance”. It was not a flamboyant scent demanded by the era, but an “air”—structure made clear, layers of sensation stacked with exactitude. And it aligns with the direction Jungkook has consistently chosen in his music: Nuance over sheer force or trendiness; the right kind of negative space over showy performance—much like Bleu de Chanel, which is sensual yet exacting, simple yet impossible to imitate. His vocals and performance express emotion without spilling over; his movements onstage are flamboyant yet precise.

Wearing a white knit with long sleeves, Jungkook steps in front of the camera. He looks more like a young dancer in Paris than a pop star capable of drawing crowds from New York to Seoul. His hair is curlier than usual, yet he carries a deeper, more mature mood this day. And the instant the first shutter clicks, he enters the frame as though he has always belonged there—without exaggerated gestures, finding the exact centre of the scene.

Now, more than a hundred years after Gabrielle Chanel created N°5, N°19, and Coco Mademoiselle, Jungkook stands in the same place, in the same room, quietly gazing out at Place Vendôme through the window that has become the leitmotif of the shoot. When the shoot requires opening that window—facing the square, uncomfortably close to tourists—the ELLE team can’t help but tense up because of safety and security concerns. Jungkook simply smiles and says, “It’s okay.” In the end, they open it—and the square, as if it had been waiting for the moment, offers up a beautiful sky. That shot becomes the best cut—one that is later blown up to cover the exterior of the building in Seoul that houses ELLE Korea’s headquarters.

During the shoot, small bursts of laughter keep punctuating the session. It is the first time Jungkook is working one-on-one with this photographer, and as they trade opinions, they often break into laughter at the same time. He doesn’t exaggerate himself. He doesn’t push for more in front of the camera; he doesn’t force emotions into something performative. He says only what he wants to say, and shows only what he can. And that honesty always creates the right moment—the real moment—that the photographs capture.

Jungkook leans quietly against the fireplace of the Coco Chanel suite. Between mid-tempo, groovy music, he controls the distance between fast cuts and slow cuts, keeping his own tempo with softer movements than the strong, dynamic energy he often shows onstage or in other editorials. Rather than posing, he watches the room, follows the movement of light, and listens. Sometimes he eases the tension with a glance or a few words. He greets Chanel Beauty staff in English, and depending on the mood, he unbuttons and re-fastens the cuffs of a silky shirt himself, takes off a long coat, then puts it back on again—each gesture quietly showing why he is the person that is in that room, right now.

Vocalist. Performer. Global pop icon. BTS’s youngest. Here, in this moment, there is simply Jungkook—28-years-young—absorbing the scent of Paris, on the first page of his chapter as Chanel Beauty’s global ambassador. With the final click of the shutter, what Jungkook leaves behind isn’t just a few photographs.

Today, he naturally overlays the time of Chanel fragrance with his own. Jungkook is, at times, an artist whose age is hard to place. Some days he feels like a boy who lives forever inside his own song “Euphoria”. Other days, he is like the protagonist of “My Time”—someone who “grew up faster than anyone”. He always seems as if he’s flying across the world, yet he’s also someone who’s always at home, doing kanchokkang [a snack hunt].

Some people grow through effort; some are loved for the talent they are born with. Jungkook moves somewhere in between, at his own pace. His charm isn’t made from flashy records or titles, as those who love him already know. As he tells us, “I want to live forever in the time of the people who listen to my music.”

Beauty Editor JUNG YOUN JI
Features Editor JEON HYE JIN
Make-up Artist KIM DA REUM
Hairstylist KIM HWA YEON
Fashion Stylist KIM YOU NG JIN
Art Designer LEE SO JEONG/Chanel