Bella Hadid was all at sea on Thursday as she took advantage of a rare break between red carpet events at the 79th Cannes Film Festival. 

The American supermodel has caused quite a stir upon La Promenade de la Croisette since arriving in the French resort town, notably during Tuesday's screening of La Bataille De Gaulle.

But the Birkin inspired gown that turned so many heads as she crossed the red carpet that evening was traded for a striking swimsuit as she cruised the French Riviera. 

Hadid, 29, showed off her lithe physique while admiring the view from the top deck of a luxury yacht during a relaxing afternoon in the south of France. 

With spring temperatures soaring, the model rounded off her look with a pair of heavily tinted sunglasses while gazing out at the sweeping Cannes coastline. 

She appeared to be enjoying a break away from the spotlight after dominating the red carpet this year's festival - despite having little or nothing to do with any of the film's being screened in-competition. 

On Tuesday, the Texan model paid tribute to legendary Anglo-French singer and actress singer Jane Birkin in a custom-made ivory lace gown from Schiaparelli. 

Fans of Birkin, who famously inspired the Hermes bag and died in 2023 aged 76, may have spotted its uncanny similarity to one worn by Birkin at the same festival six decades earlier.

In 1969, aged 22, Birkin appeared on the red carpet with musician boyfriend Serge Gainsbourg in a white crochet dress, by Pucci, that went on to become one of her most iconic looks.

Where Birkin's was cut in a loose and flowing kaftan style in keeping with the laid-back 'hippy' ethos of the 60s, Hadid's hugged her body like a second skin.

And while Birkin's look was the result of a last-minute wardrobe fix – she deemed the dress's neckline too high, and decided to wear it backwards – Hadid's was considerably less spontaneous.

In 2026, so high are the stakes on the red carpet that there's little appetite for suddenly switching up your look, as Birkin did in 1969 by converting her dress's plunging back into a daring keyhole shape fastened with a brooch.

Hadid's look was the result of hours of meticulous planning – 22,160 hours, to be precise, according to a press release issued by Schiaparelli.

The previous day it was the accessories that caught the eye, with Hadid, whose father Mohamed is of Palestinian descent, sporting a Palestine key necklace over her cropped Tom Ford top.

A symbol of resistance against oppression, the key-shaped accessory is an homage to the 750,000 Palestinian-Arabs who were forced from their homes with little more than their house keys during the 1948 Nakba - interpreted as the 'catastrophe.'

The enforced displacement and seizure of Palestinian land, property, and belongings by Israel, three years after the collapse of Nazi Germany, affected almost half of Palestine's largely Arab population.

Hadid's reference to Israeli oppression follows a series of similar political statements, notably her decision to wear a dress fashioned from a Keffiyeh during the 2024 Cannes Film Festival.

Outside of the Middle East and North Africa, the Keffiyeh has gained popularity among pro-Palestinian activists and is widely considered to be an symbol of solidarity with the Palestinians in their fight against Israel.

The show of support came after Hadid was publicly fact-checked for posting pictures taken in a Syrian refugee camp as she voiced support for Gaza and Palestinians.

The supermodel had shared an image of children in Yarmouk after an assault by dictator Bashar al-Assad during the Syrian civil war in 2013.

Captioning the post, she wrote: 'Thousands of innocents Palestinian men women and CHILDREN imprisoned without trial.

But Syrian-Americans were quick to call out the model over the misleading posts on the war.

'This is not the first time she's done this with these SAME IMAGES of children from Yarmouk,' wrote American Enterprise Institute media strategist Kareem Rifai at the time.

'Completely unacceptable and irresponsible for a mega-celebrity with massive reach. Syrians are still being killed by Assad every day.'