Beyond the Red Carpet: A Fashion Traveller's Guide to Cannes and the French Riviera

For twelve days each May, Cannes becomes the most photographed town on the French Riviera, its Croisette lined with premieres, step-and-repeats and stars in couture gowns worth more than most apartments.

But the town's appeal outlasts the festival calendar by a long way. The same Croisette that hosts the red carpet each spring is, for the rest of the year, a genuinely pleasant palm-lined seafront promenade, backed by boutique-lined streets in the old town of Le Suquet and a covered market, Marché Forville, worth visiting for its produce alone.

Travellers chasing a taste of the festival's glamour without the crowds are best served by visiting in the shoulder months either side of May, when hotel prices along the seafront drop significantly and the boutiques that cater to festival guests many carrying resort and eveningwear from the same houses seen on the red carpet are far easier to browse without a festival badge required. For a broader Riviera trip, Nice and Antibes are both a short train ride away and offer their own, less crowded versions of the same coastal glamour, making a multi-stop itinerary along the coast an easy add-on to any Cannes visit.