Gabrielle "Coco" Chanel (1883–1971) and the House of Chanel
Born in August of 1883, Gabrielle Chanel was a French native who was
destined to liberate women from the constraints of corsets and other
uncomfortable garments. A true rebel and visionary, Chanel, who changed
her name to Coco after a brief career as a singer, preferred to wear
clothes she could move freely in; often, her style were imbued with a
mannish aesthetic. Indeed, Coco Chanel, who designed her first cardigan
to avoid pulling any garment over her head, was really the originator of
modern women’s sportswear. Her desire for freedom and self-expression
gave women style without sacrifice…
Her childhood was not easy; her mother died young, when Gabrielle was
just twelve years old, and in time, the young girl was sent to live in an
orphanage…the nuns who cared for her also taught her the rudiments of
sewing.
It was in 1931 while in Monte Carlo that Chanel made the acquaintance of Samuel Goldwyn. The introduction was made through a mutual friend, the Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovich,
cousin to the last czar of Russia, Nicolas II. Goldwyn offered Chanel a
tantalizing proposition. For the sum of a million dollars
(approximately seventy-five million today), he would bring her to
Hollywood twice a year to design costumes for MGM stars. Chanel accepted
the offer. En route to California from New York traveling in a white
train car, which had been luxuriously outfitted specifically for her
use, she was interviewed by Colliers magazine in 1932.
Chanel's own lifestyle fueled her ideas of how modern women everywhere
should look, act, and dress. Her own slim boyish figure and cropped hair
became an ideal, as did her tanned skin, active lifestyle, and
financial independence. Throughout her career, Chanel succeeded in
packaging and marketing her own personal attitudes and style, making her
a key arbiter of women's taste throughout the twentieth century.
The designer's passionate interests inspired her fashions. Her apartment
and her clothing followed her favorite color palette, shades of beige,
black, and white).
Elements from her art collection and theatrical interests likewise
provided themes for her collections. When Chanel
attended a masquerade ball dressed as a figure from a Watteau painting, she later reworked the costume into a woman's suit. She hired Russian émigrés from her circle of friends to work in her embroidery
workshop, creating designs to her exacting specifications. Known for a
relentless drive for perfection, whether in design or fit, and strong
opinions in all matters of taste, Chanel backed her clothing with the
authority of her personal conviction.
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