Gabrielle (Coco) Chanel

 

Gabrielle Chanel (1883-1971) was born out of wedlock on August 19, 1883 in the French town of Saumur in the Loire Valley to Albert Chanel, an itinerant salesman, and Jeanne Devolle. In July of 1884, her parents finally married. Her mother died of asthma when she was thirty-three years old. Chanel was sent to an orphanage in Aubazine with her two sisters when she was twelve years old. The girls spent the holidays with their grandparents in Moulins. Chanel moved there permanently in 1900 and attended the local convent school with her aunt Adrienne, who was her age. Both girls found work as dressmakers, assisting Monsieur Henri Desboutin of the House of Grampayre, after being taught to sew by the nuns.

Early Career

Chanel performed evening concerts at the fashionable café La Rotonde. Her rendition of the song "Qui qu'a vu Coco dans le Trocadéro" is thought to have earned her the nickname "Coco." Chanel became involved in fashionable circles after moving in 1908 to live with Étienne Balsan, who bred racehorses on his vast estate in La Croix-Saint-Ouen. Chanel's astute clothing choices—her neat tailor-made suits and masculine riding dress—and modest demeanor distinguished her from the other courtesans. Chanel demonstrated great confidence in her own sense of style from an early age, a formula that proved irresistible to other women. Balsan's friends soon requested that she make them replicas of the boater hats she trimmed and wore herself. Seizing this opportunity for financial independence, Chanel persuaded Balsan to let her set up a millinery business in his Paris apartment at 160, boulevard Malesherbes in 1908-1909. As the business grew, she hired a professional milliner, as well as her sister Antoinette and two other assistants.

During her time in Paris, Chanel's friendship with millionaire entrepreneur and polo player Arthur Capel, known as "Boy," blossomed into love. Boy was the one who gave her the money to rent commercial space on the rue Cambon, in the heart of Paris' couture district, where the House of Chanel was still located in the early 2000s. Chanel Modes first opened its doors in 1910 at 21, rue Cambon. Chanel was the ideal model for her own designs from the start, and she was photographed for the fall 1910 issue of the magazine Le théâtre: Revue mensuelle illustrée. By 1912, Chanel hats were being worn by leading actresses of the time, including Lucienne Roger and Gabrielle Dorziat. Chanel was now financially independent. Her lease, however, prohibited her from selling clothes because there was already a dressmaker working in the building.

First Collections, 1913-1919

In the summer of 1913, while on vacation in Deauville on France's west coast, Boy Capel found a shop for Chanel to open on the fashionable rue Gontaut-Biron, and it was here that she presented her first fashion collections. When World War I broke out in July 1914, many wealthy and fashionable Parisians decamped to Deauville to shop at Chanel's boutique. She is thought to have only sold ready-to-wear clothing at this time. During this time, Chanel cut her hair short, and many other women copied her bobbed hairstyle and bought her clothes. Chanel's time had come: her understated designs, versatile and sporty, were to prove ideal for the more active lives led by many wealthy women during the war.

Chanel purchased a stock of surplus jersey fabric from Rodier in 1916, which she transformed into unstructured three-quarter-length coats belted at the waist and embellished with luxurious fabrics or furs, which she wore with matching skirts. Chanel debuted her first full couture collection that fall. The March 1917 issue of Les Élégances parisiennes features a group of Chanel jersey suits, some delicately embroidered, others plain and accessorized with a saddlery-style double belt. They're all paired with open-neck blouses with deep sailor collars. A 1918 design featured a tan jersey coat banded with brown rabbit fur, with a white-dotted rose foulard lining and blouse: this matching of the coat lining to the dress or blouse was to become a Chanel trademark. Chanel's jersey fashions created a stir with their simplicity and modernity.

Chanel's daywear was distinguished by its stylish utility, whereas her evening wear was unabashedly romantic. In 1919, she debuted delicate gowns in black Chantilly lace with gold-spun net and jet tassels, as well as silver lace brocade gowns. Black velvet capes adorned with rows of ostrich fringe revealed a Spanish influence—the pinnacle of fashion that winter. This was the year Chanel declared, "I woke up famous," but it was also the year Boy Capel was killed in a car accident.

The 1920s

Fashions of the Early 1920s

Chanel maintained a liaison with Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovitch, grandson of Russia's Tsar Alexander II, from 1920 to 1923, and her collections during this time were infused with Russian influences. Exiled aristocrats stitched exquisite, brightly colored, folkloric Russian embroideries on loose shift dresses, waistcoats, blouses, and evening coats in dark and neutral colors. Chanel debuted long, lean, belted blouses inspired by Russian peasant wear in 1922.

By 1923, she had simplified her clothing cuts and offered fewer brocaded fabrics, while her embroideries—red and beige were popular colors that year—displayed more restrained and modernistic designs. Chanel pioneered the global trend toward shorter hemlines. Her rue Cambon location, which had already expanded in 1919, expanded to include numbers 27, 29, and 31 in the early 1920s.

Perfumes

Chanel No. 5 was her first perfume, released in 1921. Ernest Beaux allegedly named No. 5 after the designer's lucky number, and he used aldehydes (an organic compound that yields acids when oxidized and alcohols when reduced) to enhance the fragrance of such expensive natural ingredients as jasmine, the perfume's base note. Chanel created her own modern pharmaceutical-style bottle and monochrome packaging. Chanel No. 5 was the first perfume to bear the name of its creator. Following the success of No. 5, Chanel released Cuir de Russie (1924), Bois des Îles (1926), and Gardénia (1927) before the decade's end.

La Garçonne

Chanel's interpretation of masculine styles and sportswear—her blazers, waistcoats, and cufflink-adorned shirts, as well as her fabric choices—were heavily influenced by the garments worn by the Duke of Westminster (an Englishman with whom she was involved between 1923 and 1930) and his aristocratic friends. She introduced her customers to Fair Isle woolens and tweeds after a fishing trip to Scotland. The duke purchased a mill for her in order to secure exclusive fabrics for her new designs. Chanel was also inspired by more humble masculine garments, such as berets, reefer jackets, mechanics' dungarees, stonemasons' neckerchiefs, and sailor suits, which she transformed into opulent pieces for her wealthy clients. Chanel herself frequently wore loose sailor-style trousers, defying sartorial etiquette rules that generally prohibited women from wearing trousers to the beach or as evening pajamas.

Chanel's jersey suit in soft tan wool, with collar, cuffs, blouse, and jacket lining in rose jersey, was recommended by Vogue in 1927 for the woman who wanted to look chic on board ship. The long-line jacket buttoned diagonally, and the front of the skirt was box-pleated. Chanel paid close attention to the cut of her sleeves throughout her career, ensuring that they allowed the wearer to move freely without distorting the lines of the garment. Her sportswear was still slim but longer by the fall of 1929, with hemlines reaching below the calf.

The Little Black Dress

Chanel began designing black dresses in 1913, when she created a black velvet gown with a white petal collar for Suzanne Orlandi. According to British Vogue, "Chanel takes into account the lack of motors and the general difficulty of living in Paris right now by her almost invariably black evening dresses" in April 1919. (p. 48). But it wasn't until American Vogue (1 October 1926) described a garçonnestyle black day dress as "The Chanel 'Ford'-the frock that the world will wear" (p. 69) that the little black dress became a fashion phenomenon. Although the use of black in fashion has a long history, Chanel has always been credited as its pioneer.

Theatrical Costume

During the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the stage served as a prominent showcase for fashion designers. Chanel was always involved in artistic circles, and she frequently supported her friends' work both financially and collaboratively. She created Grecian-style costumes in coarse wool for Jean Cocteau's adaptation of Sophocles' Antigone in 1922; the designs were featured in French Vogue. The Ballets russes dancers were dressed in jersey bathing suits and sports clothes similar to those seen in her fashion collections for the modern-realist production Le train bleu the following year. In 1926, the actresses in Jean Cocteau's Orphée were dressed head to toe in Chanel.

Jewelry

Chanel believed that the role of jewelry was to decorate an ensemble rather than to flaunt wealth, and she defied convention by wearing heaps of jewelry, often precious, during the day—even while sailing—and wearing no jewelry at all at night. Chanel's loose, straight-cut shapes and use of many plain fabrics provided the ideal foil for the lavish costume jewelry she introduced in the early 1920s. Chanel's designs defied nature in their bold use of color and size, despite the lack of desire to replicate precious jewels. In 1924, she established her own jewelry workshop, which was overseen by comte Étienne de Beaumont. Beaumont created the long chains with colored stones and cross-shaped pendants that became a house classic. Chanel admired Byzantine crosses and was inspired by military costume buttons, chains, and tassels.

Her oversized fake pearls, which she wore in multiple strands, were an instant hit. Chanel popularized mismatched earrings in 1926 by wearing a black pearl in one ear and a white pearl in the other. She debuted diamond paste jewelry in 1928 and "gypsy" necklaces—triple strands of red, green, and yellow beads, as well as colored beads combined with chunky wooden chains—in 1929.

Fashions of the Later 1920s

Chanel's fashions were adorned with geometric designs by the late 1920s. She used stripes and checks, as well as patterns inspired by Fair Isle knitwear, for daywear, and many of her black lace fabrics were combined with metallic, embroidered, or beaded laces for evening wear.

During the mid-to-late 1920s, at the height of her fame and with demand for Paris couture at its peak, Chanel employed between two and three thousand people. She was said to be a harsh taskmaster who paid low wages. She opened her London home in 1927. While the concept and feel of Chanel's current collection were essentially French, the designer had adapted it for London social life, according to British Vogue in early June 1927. She offered a long-sleeved black lace dress with trailing scarf detail for the Royal Ascot racing meet and an understated white taffeta dress with a train cut in one piece with the skirt for presentation at court, complemented by a simple headdress based on the Prince of Wales feathers. "When Chanel, the sponsor of the straight, chemise dress and the boyish silhouette, uses little, rippling capes on her fur coats and a high waist-line and numerous ruffles on an evening gown, then you can be sure that the feminine mode is a fact and not a fancy," Vogue wrote in September 1929.

Chanel installed faceted glass mirrors in her Paris couture salon around 1928, in keeping with her modernist fashion aesthetic. These mirrors provided the benefit of allowing her to sit out of sight while watching her shows. Her private apartment on the third floor of 31, rue Cambon was lavish and ornate, in stark contrast to the salon. It has been meticulously restored, with Coromandel screens, Louis XIV furniture, Venetian mirrors, black-amoor sculptures, and smoked crystal and amethyst chandeliers. Chanel would remove nonessentials from clothes for the sake of the wearer's comfort; however, when designing domestic interiors, she believed that clutter was a necessity—that being surrounded by the objects one needed and loved was essential.

The 1930s

Fashions of the Early 1930s

Although Chanel's business suffered during the depression—she is said to have cut her prices in half in 1932--her workforce had grown to around 4,000 by 1935. In June 1936, Chanel's saleswomen and seamstresses went on strike to protest their low wages and working conditions. The French people elected a left-wing coalition government led by Leon Blum in April 1936, which was followed by a number of strikes, including those at Chanel. Chanel refused to implement the Matignon Agreement, which included 7 to 15% wage increases, the right to collective bargaining and unionization, a 40-hour work week, and a two-week paid annual holiday. Instead, she fired 300 women who refused to leave the building, and only later, in order to produce her next collection, did she agree to establish a workers' cooperative on the condition that she manage it (Madsen, p. 216).

Chanel's hemlines became longer and slightly flared beginning in 1930; she emphasized her waists, and her jackets had soft, bloused bodices. Bows were to become a signature motif, appearing as decorative details on her garments' shoulders and skirts. Her blouses were adorned with cravat bows, and crisp white frills were added around the collars and cuffs of her black suits and dresses. Chanel began using American elasticized fabrics with a latex core called Lastex in her collections in 1934 to create clothes with a crepe-like surface, which she frequently combined with jersey.

During the 1930s, she launched her cosmetics line and debuted Glamour, a new perfume. She increased her earnings by endorsing the products of other manufacturers and designing for other businesses. In 1931, she promoted Ferguson Brothers' cottons (her spring collection included cotton evening gowns), and she designed Ellaness knitwear and David Mosley and Sons raincoats. She also made $2 million that year for her work in Hollywood.

Screen and Stage

When hemlines dropped in 1929, it devastated Hollywood's film studios, as thousands of reels of film were instantly rendered out of date. Rather than slavishly following Parisian fashions, studio magnate Samuel Goldwyn invited Chanel to design costumes for his leading female stars, including Greta Garbo, Gloria Swanson, and Marlene Dietrich. Chanel, on the other hand, only designed for three Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer films: Palmy Days (1931), Tonight or Never (1931), and The Greeks Had a Word for Them (1931). Many actresses refused to be imposed Chanel's style, and her designs were either ignored or criticized for being too understated for the screen.

Chanel continued to design costumes for progressive plays in Paris, including Cocteau's La machine infernale (1934), Les chevaliers de la table ronde, and Oedipe-Roi, both of which were released in 1937. Moreover, despite her dislike of left-wing politics, she designed the costumes for Jean Renoir's radical films La marseillaise and La règle du jeu, both of which were released in 1938.

Jewelry

The International Guild of Diamond Merchants commissioned Chanel to design the Bijoux de Diamants collection of diamonds set in platinum in 1932. Chanel, who had designed fake jewels during prosperous times, now declared that diamonds were an investment. She presented a line of jewelry based on knots, stars, and feathers with her current lover, Paul Iribe. The collection was displayed in her home on Paris's rue du Faubourg-Saint-Honoré.

Fulco di Santostefano della Cerda, duc di Verdura, began designing jewelry for Chanel in the 1930s. Since 1927, he had been designing textiles for her. Most notably, di Verdura pioneered the revival of baked enamel jewelry, particularly his chunky, baked enamel bracelets inset with jeweled Maltese crosses. Christian Bérard created a few pieces for her, and Maison Gripoix continued to produce many of her designs, particularly those in romantic floral and rococo-revival styles. Chanel's heavy triangular bibs of colored stones and coins, as well as her silk cord necklaces with tassels of brilliantly colored stones, showed influences from India and Southeast Asia from the mid-to-late 1930s.

Fashions of the Later 1930s

Chanel's daywear remained simple, but, perhaps surprisingly, she joined the vogue for Victorian-revival styles, presenting cinch-waisted, full-skirted, and bustle-backed evening gowns with shoulder-length lace gloves and floral accessories. The trouser suit worn by fashion editor Diana Vreeland in 1937-1938 was decidedly more modern, consisting of a black bolero-style jacket and high-waisted trousers entirely covered in overlapping sequins. The metallic sheen of the sequins stood out against a soft cream silk chiffon and lace blouse with a ruffled neckline and pearl buttons. Chanel's dramatic black-and-white or scarlet-and-white combinations remained popular. In the late 1930s, her evening wear revealed gypsy and peasant influences: multicolored taffeta skirts, sometimes striped or checked, worn with puff-sleeved, embroidered blouses.

The War Years

During WWII, Chanel closed her fashion house but continued to sell her perfumes. For the duration of the war, she resided at the Hotel Ritz in Paris with her German lover, a German army officer named Hans-Gunther von Dincklage. Chanel fled to Switzerland after Paris was liberated in 1944, and she did not return to the rue Cambon for nearly a decade.

The 1950s

Fashions of the 1950s

Chanel returned to work at the age of seventy in 1953, partly to boost her dwindling perfume sales. Her fashion philosophy remained consistent: she emphasized function and comfort in clothing and stated her goal of making women look pretty and young. She debuted her first postwar collection, a line of understated suits and dresses, on February 5, 1954. However, the general press reaction was that Chanel was too old and out of touch with the modern market, and only a few models were sold. American Vogue (15 February 1954) considered "the great revolutionist" important enough to devote a three-and-a-half-page article to her career and fashion philosophy: "A dress isn't right if it is uncomfortable.... A dress must function; place the pockets accurately for use, never a button without a button-hole. A sleeve isn't right unless the arm moves easily. Elegance in clothes means freedom to move freely" (American Vogue, p. 84).

Chanel reestablished herself as an international fashion designer by modernizing the formulas that had brought her so much success earlier in her career. For spring-summer 1955, she wore a gray jersey suit with a softly-fitted jacket with pockets and a full box-pleated skirt, which she paired with a bow-tied white blouse. Navy jersey suits with schoolgirl-style blazer jackets were banded with white trim and paired with navy and white striped knitwear. Buttons were frequently covered in fabrics that matched the suit, and they were sometimes meticulously trimmed with the contrasting fabric used to outline the pockets and form the attached shirt cuffs. Other buttons were molded in bright brass, sometimes with a lion's head—Chanel's birth sign was Leo—or in more delicate gilt, possibly with a cutwork floral motif.

Chanel introduced braid trimmings to her cardigan-style jackets in 1957. Her suits had a wrap pleat that ran down the side of the skirt and concealed a trouser-style pocket for fall-winter 1957-1958. She wore a hat with each model, which was unusual; these were upturned sailor-style hats made in soft fabrics that matched the suits. She paid special attention to the linings of her coats and suits, as she always does: camel hair was lined with red guanaco this season, gray tweed with white squirrel, and red velour with fluffy gray goatskin. Her coats were cut in the same style as her suit jackets, but were lengthened to match the hem of her skirt.

Chanel's modern suits in nubby wools, tweeds, or jersey fabrics with multiple functional pockets, paired with gilt chains and fake pearl jewelry; her distinct handbags; and her sling-back shoes with contrasting toe caps became affluent fashion staples. And, as before, her designs were widely copied for the mass market: the company sold toiles to the British chain store Wallis in order for it to legally reproduce Chanel's designs.

Chanel offered evening variations on her suits in lavish materials such as gold-trimmed brocade, and she stayed true to her love of black-and-white laces for dresses. A cocktail dress from the spring-summer 1958 collection featured a navy-and-white-striped silk bodice with a large bow at the neckline and a full skirt of white organdy with the same striped fabric banded at the hem.

She presented a black lace dress, dipping low at the back and molded to the hipline, threaded with black ribbon and flared into a full skirt for spring-summer 1959; it was accessorized with a long chain with linked pearls and chunky, colored stones. The collection was modeled that season by the designer's friends—stylish young women who were used to wearing her clothes.

Perfumes and Accessories

Pour Monsieur, a man's fragrance, was introduced by Chanel in 1954. Pierre and Paul Wertheimer, who already owned Parfums Chanel, bought her entire company the same year, and it remained in the Wertheimer family until the early 2000s.

Chanel introduced quilted handbags with leather shoulder straps plaited with gilt chains with flattened links, similar to those used to weight her jackets, in 1955. The bags were available in beige, navy, brown, and black, and were lined with red grosgrain or leather-Chanel chose a lighter color for the interior to help women find small items in their bags. Chanel's distinctive handbags, which were updated seasonally, were still top sellers in the early 2000s.

The 1960s

Chanel fashions were no longer at the forefront of style by 1960. She despised the miniskirt, believing that a woman's knees should always be hidden. Despite this, she continued to dress a loyal clientele in suits that were subtly reworked each season. Jacqueline Kennedy was one of her most high-profile and stylish clients during this time period.

"For Mlle. Chanel's creations, the maison Chanel could be dubbed the "Jersey House." Chanel has been and will continue to be a fixture in Jersey. Chanel has recently used a thin firm quality of cotton velvet for cloaks and certain frocks." (Page 30 of British Vogue, early October 1917).

The Victoria and Albert Museum in London purchased a suit worn by Chanel in the mid-1960s (model 37750). It is made up of a three-quarter-length jacket and a dress made of black worsted crepe that falls just below the knee and is topped with a black silk stockinette-brimmed hat. The jacket's pristine white collar and cuffs are essential—some customers complained that these details wore out before the jacket itself. The suit is neat, unadorned, monochrome, and entirely functional, with echoes of a school uniform.

Chanel was asked to design for the screen again in 1962, this time for Romy Schneider in Luchino Visconti's film Boccaccio '70 and Delphine Seyrig in Alain Resnais' film Last Year at Marienbad. Coco, written by Alan Jay Lerner, became the subject of a Broadway musical about Chanel in 1969. Katharine Hepburn played the title role with Chanel's permission.

Chanel died on January 10, 1971, while preparing her spring-summer 1971 collection. In December 1978, her personal clothing and jewelry were auctioned off in London.

Postscript

Between 1971 and 1973, after Chanel's death, Gaston Berthelot was appointed to design classic garments in the Chanel tradition. Chanel's birthday inspired the creation of the perfume No. 19. From 1974 to 1980, the couture line was designed by Jean Cazaubon and Yvonne Dudel; in 1978, Philippe Guibourgé designed a ready-to-wear collection; and in 1980, Ramon Esparza joined the couture team. But it wasn't until 1983, when Karl Lagerfeld was named chief designer, that the House of Chanel made fashion headlines again: it's still the ultimate in desirability for a clientele of all ages in the early 2000s.

Lagerfeld has continued to reference Chanel style since his appointment, sometimes offering classic interpretations and other times making witty and ironic statements. Finally, he has modernized the label to make it relevant in today's market. Surfing and cycling outfits inspired his fall-winter 1990-1991 collection; training shoes bearing the distinctive interlocked CC logo were shown for fall-winter 1993-1994; nautical styles were shown for spring-summer 1994; and skiwear styles were shown for fall-winter 2003-2004. While Chanel was inspired by the utilitarian clothing of the working man, Lager-feld draws inspiration from contemporary social subcultures. He's shown fetishistic PVC jeans, lace-up bustiers, dog collars, and plastic raincoats (fall-winter 1991-1992); biker-style leather jackets, trousers, and boots (fall-winter 1992-1993 and fall-winter 2002-2003); B-Boy and Ragga-inspired styles (spring-summer 1994); and a more eclectic "rock chic" style (spring-summer 1994). The tweed suit remains a mainstay of the collections, appealing to both classic tastes with cardigan styles and more daring younger clients with tweed bra tops and micro-miniskirts. The classic cardigan-style suit is now available in terry cloth, and denim jackets are embellished with Chanel's favorite camellia flowers. Costume jewelry is abundant, and the little black dress is inextricably linked to the name Chanel.

The House of Chanel purchased five artisan workshops in 2002 to ensure the survival of the couture industry's refined craft skills: the top embroiderer François Lesage, the expert shoemaker Raymond Massaro, the flamboyant milliner Maison Michel, the feather specialist André Lemarié, and the leading costume jeweler Desrues.

Chanel perfumes continue to be popular. Since the death of the founder, the company has released Cristalle (1974), Coco (1984), No. 5 Eau de Parfum (1986), Allure (1996), Coco Mademoiselle (2001), and Chance (2002) for women, as well as Antaeus pour Homme (1981), Egoste (1990), Platinum Egoste (1993), and Allure Homme (1999) for men.