There are luxury brands, and then there is Chanel.
The fashion house was founded in 1910 by Gabrielle ‘Coco’ Chanel, who set the template for a new way to dress women – and her influence has resonated in our wardrobes ever since.
The novelist André Malraux stated that Charles de Gaulle, Pablo Picasso and Gabrielle Chanel were the three most important figures of the 20th century.
Chanel’s impact has continued into the 21st century: On TikTok, the brand’s hashtag has been viewed 11.5 billion times and a bottle of No. 5 perfume is sold every 30 seconds worldwide.
Now the designer is the subject of the V&A’s latest blockbuster exhibition, Gabrielle Chanel. Fashion Manifesto, the first major British retrospective exhibition about hair.
“Chanel was always a bit of a mystery,” says Oriole Cullen, curator of the exhibition, which includes original pieces from Chanel’s own wardrobe, as well as suits and dresses worn by the likes of Lauren Bacall, Marlene Dietrich and Jeanne Moreau.
The fashion house was founded in 1910 by Gabrielle ‘Coco’ Chanel (pictured in the late 1950s), who set the template for a new way of dressing women
“She hid her background. You can never really pin her down. We start by looking at her beginnings as a milliner, and how she used her own image to represent her brand, which was quite new at the time. Her designs were very different from what was fashionable.’
From the beginning, Chanel was a rebel, always opposing accepted views on how women should dress.
She took inspiration from men’s and workwear to create jersey pieces (usually used for men’s underwear), which were more practical and sober than the stiff, elaborate pieces commonly worn at the time.
The exhibition features a marinière blouse from 1916, with a wide collar inspired by traditional fishermen’s sweaters.
“It was very hands-on,” says Cullen. ‘She had this brilliant sense of knowing what people wanted. She read the spirit of the times, but also designed clothes that were wearable.
“She had radical ideas,” Cullen adds, referring to Chanel’s decision to ditch the fussy details, endless buttons and corsets of the time.
After the First World War and the emancipation of women from the shackles of the family, Chanel’s vision was prescient.
In 1926, Vogue named her versatile black dress ‘the Ford’ because, like the successful Model T car, it was perfect for modern women’s life and suitable for any occasion.
Pictured: A sequin evening dress and cape in 1937. In 1939, as Paris began to mobilize for war, Chanel closed its stores
Although she never married, Chanel had a series of relationships with men that would influence her career. Her affair with Russian émigré Grand Duke Dmitry Pavlovich resulted in the conception of her fragrance No. 5 in 1921 after he introduced her to the perfumer Ernest Beaux who helped her develop the iconic scent.
Beaux created a unique blend of jasmine, rose, sandalwood and ylang-ylang and added a synthetic aldehyde, a form of fragrance enhancer, to mask the ingredients so they couldn’t be copied. Chanel chose the fifth sample and she kept the numerical name because she believed the number was lucky.
Her next affair, with the Duke of Westminster, took her to Britain. “In 1932 she founded the British Chanel to work with a number of textile manufacturers,” says Cullen.
‘She worked with lace from Nottingham; Manchester velvet; wool from Huddersfield and voiles and cotton from Carlisle.’
Cullen added: “We have a lovely film showing fashion shows in Grosvenor Square that took place over two weeks with a range of society models. The public could buy a ticket for a catwalk show and the money went to charity.’
It reveals Chanel’s desire to create the kind of ‘fashion-tainment’ that defines the industry today. Decades before the birth of social media, she was adept at creating hype.
In 1939, as Paris began to mobilize for war, Chanel closed her stores, although the perfume continued to be sold in other stores, and the proceeds helped her finance her living at the Ritz Paris.
While the first half of her career gave us the little black dress, the Breton stripes, No. 5 and a languid silhouette, in the second half the revived house of Chanel created three more style icons: the tweed suit, the 2 handbag, 55 and the two-tone shoe.
These are all styles that, Cullen emphasizes, have been copied endlessly, just like all other styles
the innovations of the fashion house. “It’s the amazing thing about Chanel clothes,” she says. ‘Almost every designer has created their own version of a Chanel jacket – it’s always available on the high street. But when you see the actual garment, that’s where the luxury is: it’s in the textile, it’s in the construction.’
Gabrielle Chanel. Fashion Manifesto can be seen at the V&A until 25 February 2024; vam.ac.uk