Here I am in Deauville, Normandy, in front of the gorgeous drawing of Gabrielle Chanel executed in 2011 by Karl Lagerfeld on the wall of n°11-13 Lucien Barrière street, formerly Gontaut-Biron street, in Deauville.
As you can imagine, the location of the drawing is not insignificant since it marks the address of the designer’s first fashion boutique, opened in 1913. Three years earlier, she opened a boutique at n°21 (and not 31) Cambon street in Paris but it is, by patent, limited to the creation and sale of hats since a seamstress already works within the Parisian building. The fact remains that her Parisian success is very real, but it is in Deauville, where she proposes hats and functional clothing adapted to Summer life, that Gabrielle’s success will grow.
The location is well chosen: the shop is located in the luxurious and active district of the city, in one of the commercial spaces designed by architect Théo Petit next to and behind the casino of the seaside town.
Gabrielle Chanel is the first and best customer of the Chanel brand: she only creates clothes that she wears herself. Her hair is still impossibly long, but it’s been a few years since she abandoned corsets and falbalas for a style suited to her modest standard of living and her simple, active lifestyle. It is, compared to the fashion of the time, a fairly radical posture, which involves the simplification of headgear, the purification of the silhouette, the use of materials – such as jersey and sailor tops – worn by the poor classes and an androgynous look which redefines a seduction which plays as much on feminine codes as on masculine codes.
My relationship with Gabrielle Chanel is – unlike my relationship with Christian Dior – far from peaceful.
I admire the designer who knew how to capture the spirit of her times and impose a radical style; the marketing genius that she has always been and who made us forget – contrary to the commonly accepted legend – she was not the one who got rid of women’s corsets (nor even Paul Poiret, for that matter, in accordance with another commonly accepted legend) but Madeleine Vionnet who worked for Jacques Doucet and who was fired by the outraged couturier for such an initiative.
I admire the independent woman who never wanted to be confined to the role of a kept woman despite her obvious charm. Successively “irregular” mistress– to paraphrase her biographer Edmonde Charles-Roux – of two men significantly wealthier than her, she made it a point of honor to repay the second one who financed the beginnings of the house of Chanel.
I admire the generous and discreet patronage she gave to the artists of her time, whether they were Diaghilev, Cocteau, Reverdy or Stravinsky.
However, the human qualities of this monument of French fashion leave – in my opinion – a lot to be desired. The harshness of her character, which most probably finds its source in a difficult childhood, made her notoriously mean (particularly to her friends) and led her during the infamous Occupation era to a fortunately unsuccessful attempt to spoliate Jewish property from her partners the Wertheimer brothers in the company which owns Chanel perfumes. Her attitude during WWII was particularly ambiguous: she closed the house of Chanel at the start of the conflict (only the perfume boutique will remain open), moved to the Ritz hotel which was requisitioned by the Nazis, took as a lover a German embassy attaché, Hans von Dincklage and even participated in Operation Modellhut, the essence of which lay in the establishment of a dialogue between Churchill (whom Chanel knew) and certain members of the Reichssicherheitshauptamt, the central security office of the Reich. We will never know if Gabrielle Chanel’s intentions, wanting to work for the end of the conflict, were pacifist or if it was her sympathies for the Reich and its predominance over Europe which spurred her involvement.
But back to Deauville, back to 1913.
The designer who opened her first fashion boutique in Deauville, rue Gontaut-Biron, is 30 years old. She’s not exactly an innocent young woman anymore. Her background is unclear, because she is the first one to lie about her background. What do we know about her childhood and adolescence today?
Gabrielle was born in 1883 out of wedlock to a fairground father who had no regard for his offspring and to a weak mother who died at the dawn of her 12th birthday, but quickly invents a father who is a wine merchant who makes millions in America. She experiences a dark and sad adolescence with her wicked maternal aunts during which solitude reigns but will always highlight the beauty and purity of the years she would have spent at the orphanage of Aubazine Abbey and which will be later the source of the famous contrast between the colors sand and black, the intertwined “C”s and a chanelized monastic austerity.
Did Gabrielle really spend her adolescence in Aubazine? We’ll never know. The abbey archives have disappeared.
She does not mention the Aubazine orphanage in any way in her interviews with Paul Morand in which she only talks about her wicked aunts (“The Allure of Chanel” by Paul Morand) and only Edmonde Charles-Roux, who today represents the Chanel canon, mentions this Aubazine episode in the biography she dedicated in 1974 to Chanel (“L’Irrégulière”).
Henri Ponchon, vice-president of the Cercle Généalogiste d’Auvergne, expresses serious doubts as to the veracity of Chanel’s passage to Aubazine in his work published in 2016 “The Childhood of Chanel” and instead finds Gabrielle Chanel in jobs as a maid child or servant in Thiers while Gabrielle’s young aunt – Adrienne Chanel – spent a few years in Aubazine – which could be the source of the confusion.
However, we must believe that Aubazine has enough importance in Chanel mythology since the house of Chanel finances the restoration of the abbey in 2024 up to 8 or 9 million euros.
Is this Chanel mythology intended to hide a more miserable fate of a maid or casual prostitute? We’ll never know.
The fact remains that between 1902 and 1907 Gabrielle is found in Moulins then in Vichy where she tries, alongside tailoring activities, to make a career in café-concerts where she sings “Qui qu’a vu Coco au Trocadéro”, which earns her her nickname “Coco” Chanel, which will remain forever.
This episode on the stage, in Moulins and Vichy will also never be mentioned by Gabrielle in her interviews with Paul Morand (“The Allure of Chanel”, mentioned above) which see her go from the tutelage of the evil aunts to the softer one of “M.B”.
“M.B” poorly hides “Monsieur Balsan” whom she will indeed meet and who will be the first to put her out of her misery.
Étienne Balsan is an officer and man of the world who devotes himself to the breeding of racehorses. He takes Gabrielle as his mistress and installs her in his castle in Royallieu, near Compiègne, where she learns horse riding and the codes of high society. She is a kept woman since her lifestyle is provided by him, however she is not a kept woman – in the sense of the time – because he does not spend fortunes on gifts, jewelry and other extravagances for her – which suits her very well.
Their relationship quickly falls apart, which does not prevent them from remaining friends and room/castle-mates. This does not prevent her from developing her personal style, marked by simplicity and movement: her equestrian outfits abandon Amazon outfits for jodhpurs, hats for headbands and Lavallière knots for simple ties.
It’s all in the shoulder; If a dress doesn’t fit the shoulder, the dress will never fit… The front doesn’t move, it’s the back that works. The back must have some surface, at least ten centimeters; you have to be able to bend down, play golf, put your shoes on.”
Gabrielle Chanel in “The Allure of Chanel”
At Royallieu she meets a friend of Étienne Balsan, Arthur Capel, known as “Boy”. It is love at first sight and the beginning of a crazy love story that Gabrielle Chanel would cherish until the end of her life.
Boy – unlike Balsan – understands his partner’s desire for independence and agrees to finance Gabrielle’s first Parisian boutique, who set up as a hat designer while Balsan lends his Parisian apartment.
The hats created by Gabrielle, simple and refined, quickly become a great success in the French capital.
But it is Deauville – then a few years later, Biarritz, which will change everything. Deauville sees the Chanel vision flourish: a simple, refined woman’s silhouette, without fuss, without hindrance, adapted to a simple, active and independent lifestyle. Corsets are ripped off. Skirts are getting shorter. The silhouette is new. The materials are flexible. The design of the clothing is adapted to daily life activities. The woman can dress herself.
Since you care so much about it,” Capel said to me, “I’m going to have everything you always wear elegantly redone by an English tailor”. “The whole of rue Cambon came out of there.”
Gabrielle Chanel in “The Allure of Chanel”
Gabrielle and her young aunt Adrienne parade in the streets of Deauville and are the best models of the house of Chanel. And for good reason: Chanel clothes are primarily the clothes that Gabrielle designs for herself. Gabrielle has the intelligence to understand that the outfit must be adapted to the activity and the location of the moment.
Do women want to swim? No problem, she creates a swimsuit.
The sports and active fashion revolution is on its way. Jersey – this flexible material used by the poor classes – invades Deauville, just like the fishermen’s sailor top. Masculine outfits and work clothes are diverted by the designer, who has decided to bury the Belle-Époque style. Next came pants and beach pajamas. To paraphrase Paul Morand, Gabrielle Chanel has a certain talent for making everything around her out of fashion.
It is 1913 in Deauville. The war is coming. Gabrielle wants to close her shop in Deauville but Boy convinces her to leave it open to benefit from the beautiful customers who will flock from Paris to escape the gloomy atmosphere of the war.
The success is such that Gabrielle has to install chairs and tables in front of her storefront in order to keep the customers waiting.
Boy dies a few years later in 1919, leaving Gabrielle inconsolable – but the fact remains that Deauville is the founding stone of the stunning success of the house of Chanel.
Chanel blouse, sandals, clutch and sunglasses – Laboratorio Capri trousers – Headband adorned with a Chanel brooch
May 2, 2025
