24/05/2015
Designer Coco Chanel was born
Gabrielle Bonheur Chanel in 1883,
although she would later claim that her
real date of birth was 1893, making her
ten years younger.
H er place of birth was also something
that she sought to disguise. Coco was
born in the workhouse in the Loire
Valley where her unmarried mother
worked, although she asserted that she
was born in Auvergne.
Her mother died when she was six
years old, leaving her father with five
children, whom he quickly farmed out to
various relatives. The young Chanel
was sent to the orphanage of the
Catholic monastery of Aubazine, where
she learned the trade of a seamstress.
School vacations were spent with
relatives in the provincial capital of
Moulins where Gabrielle learnt to sew
with more flourish than the nuns at the
monastery had been able to teach her.
When she turned 18, she left the
orphanage, and took up work for a local
tailor.
Later, when questioned, Chanel would
claim that when her mother died, her
father sailed for America and she was
sent to live with two cold-hearted
spinster aunts. She even claimed to
have been born in 1893 as opposed to
1883, and that her mother had died
when Coco was six instead of 12. All
this was done to diminish the stigma
that poverty, orphanhood, and
illegitimacy bestowed upon
unfortunates in 19th-century France.
It was during a brief stint as a singer in
cafés and concert halls that Gabrielle
adopted the name Coco, a nickname
given to her by local soldiers who went
to watch her.
World War I led her to move to the
resort town of Deauvile, where Chanel
became the mistress of a rich ex-
military officer and textile heir called
Etienne Balsan in 1908. At the age of
23, she became his mistress and moved
into his chateau, where she lived for
three years. It was here that she
started designing and creating hats as
a diversion, which then turned into a
commercial venture.
She then started a relationship with a
wealthy English Industrialist called
Arthur Edward 'Boy' Capel who was a
friend of Balsan. He installed her into a
Parisian apartment and financed her
first shops. The relationship lasted nine
years, even after Capel married in 1918.
Through the patronage and connections
that these men provided she was able
to open her own millinery shop in Paris
in 1910 and she soon had boutiques in
both Deauville and Biarritz. In 1919, the
single most devastating event of her life
occurred when Capel was killed in a car
accident. She commissioned a roadside
memorial at the site of the accident.
Twenty-five years after the event, she
told a friend: "His death was a terrible
blow to me. In losing Capel, I lost
everything. What followed was not a life
of happiness I have to say."
D uring the 1920s, Coco Chanel
became the first designer to create
loose women's jerseys, traditionally
used for men's underwear, creating a
relaxed style for women ignoring the
stiff corseted look of the time. They
soon became very popular with clients,
a post-war generation of women for
whom the corseted restricted clothing
seemed old-fashioned and impractical.
By the 1920s, Maison Chanel was
established at 31, Rue Cambon in Paris
(which remains its headquarters to this
day) and become a fashion force to be
reckoned with. Chanel became a style
icon herself with her striking bob
haircut and tan placing her at the
cutting edge of modern style.
In 1922, she launched the fragrance
Chanel No. 5, which remains popular to
this day. Two years later, Pierre
Wertheimer became her business
partner (taking on 70% of the fragrance
business), and reputedly her lover. The
Wertheimers continue to control the
perfume company today.
In 1925, Chanel launched her signature
cardigan jacket, and the following year
matched its success with her little
black dress. Both items continue to be
a staple part of every Chanel collection.
During World War II, Chanel was a
nurse, although her post-war popularity
was greatly diminished by her affair
with a N**i officer during the conflict
and she moved to Switzerland to
escape the controversy.
However, she ended this self-imposed
exile in 1954, returning to Paris when
she took on Christian Dior's overtly
feminine New Look. She expanded the
signature style with the introduction of
pea jackets and bell-bottoms for
women. Her new collection, panned by
the press in Europe, was a hit in the
United States.
Hollywood stars including Audrey
Hepburn and Grace Kelly fell in love
with her effortlessly stylish boxy
cardigan suits.
During her life, Coco Chanel also
designed costumes for the stage,
including Cocteau's 'Antigone' (1923)
and 'Oedipus Rex' (1937) and cinematic
works such as 'La Regle de Jeu'.
A Broadway musical of her life opened
in 1969, with Katharine Hepburn taking
the role of Chanel.
Coco Chanel worked until her death in
1971 at the age of 88, spending her last
moments in the style she had become
accustomed to at her opulent private
apartment in The Ritz.
Karl Lagerfeld has been chief designer
of Chanel's fashion house since 1982.
His ability to continuously mine the
Chanel archive for inspiration testifies
to the importance of Coco Chanel's
contribution to the world of fashion.
The first film about Chanel was 'Chanel
Solitaire' in 1981, with Marie-France
Pisier playing the designer. This was
followed by the American TV movie
'Coco Chanel' in 2008, which rewrote
her history by overlooking her
connections to the N**is.
In 2009, French actress Audrey Tatou
played the designer as a young woman
in 'Coco Before Chanel'.
