Chanel

Chanel (ʃəˈnɛl , ʃanɛl) is a French luxury fashion house founded in 1910 by Coco Chanel in Paris. It is privately owned by the Wertheimer family and has been headquartered in London since 2018. Chanel specializes in women's ready-to-wear, luxury goods, and accessories and licenses its name and branding to Luxottica for eyewear. Chanel is well known for its No. 5 perfume and "Chanel Suit". Chanel is credited for revolutionizing haute couture and ready-to-wear by replacing structured, corseted silhouettes with more functional garments that women still found flattering. Establishment and recognition (1909–1920s) The House of Chanel originated in 1909, when Gabrielle Chanel opened a millinery shop at 160 Boulevard Malesherbes, the ground floor of the Parisian flat of the socialite and textile businessman Étienne Balsan, of whom she was the mistress. Because the Balsan flat also was a salon for the French hunting and sporting élite, Chanel had the opportunity to meet their demi-mondaine mistresses who, as such, were women of fashion, upon whom the rich men displayed their wealth – as ornate clothes, jewellery, and hats. Coco Chanel thus could sell to them the hats she designed and made; she thus earned a living independent of Balsan. In the course of those salons, Coco Chanel befriended Arthur "Boy" Capel, an English socialite and polo player friend of Étienne Balsan; per the upper class social custom, Chanel also became mistress to Boy Capel. In 1910, Boy Capel financed her first independent millinery shop, Chanel Modes, at 21 rue Cambon in Paris. Because that locale already housed a dress shop, the business-lease limited Chanel to selling only millinery products, not couture. Two years later 1913, the Deauville and Biarritz couture shops of Coco Chanel offered for sale prêt-à-porter sports clothes for women, the practical designs of which allowed the wearer to play sports. The First World War (1914–1918), affected European fashion through scarcity of materials, and the mobilisation of women.