Evil or Genius
I'm filming in the studio with a team of comedians - a laugh a minute in fact. I'm the only serious one but I'm there for a reason. It's Russel Kane's TV series Evil or Genius for SKY History in which an iconic figure is assessed through the lens of contemporary and historical view-points.
I'm introduced as the resident boffin and I live in History Corner. Remember it's TV. I wrote my script. Below is not everything I said because there is always less time than one would like but you get the picture.
RUSSELL (TO HISTORY CORNER)
Caryn, tell us why is Coco Chanel such a big deal?
CARYN
A French designer she launched one of the most famous global brands in the market place today. she was an entrepreneur an innovator and a barometer for her times by recognising women wanted liberation from the very gendered stiff formal wear worn with corsetry. Because you know… It takes a woman to know what women want. Some say Paul Poiret was also up there in abolishing the corset with his designs but then he created the hobble skirt which was long and close fitting meaning that women could only take tiny steps, trip up or not go out at all. And where is he now?
She built her business by wearing her own designs (Take note Paul Poiret). She was her own muse and her own marketing guru – an early influencer and social networker in real time. She created lightweight jersey and soft knits, raised the hemlines and quite controversially for the times wore mannish clothes, as well as creating the first trousers for women.
Whatever she wore she looked amazing, and women loved her style. She introduced classless costume jewellery, rows of fake gold chains, worn with irony as a conspicuous fashion statement and in a masterstroke so that everyone could afford a little bit of Channel luxury she created Chanel No5, a scent which later stars like Marilyn Monroe loved to wear.
She also uttered the sassiest fashion quote I’ve heard…. “I don’t do fashion. I am fashion”
RUSSELL (TO HISTORY CORNER)
Caryn, everybody’s heard of Coco Chanel. Her No 5 perfume is over 100 years old. Why is her name and brand so timeless?
CARYN
We love her spirit, her confidence, her risk taking and this underpins our perceptions of the brand. At time when women were attacked or shamed for indecent exposure if they attempted to wear the bloomer, (also known as the split skirt which allowed women to ride a bike) she dared to ride a horse in jodhpurs cut from a stable groom’s pattern.
She was a taste leader and this is obvious from the way she approached perfume. Ignoring the single note floral trend, she used 80 different ingredients and created a strong blended synthetic smell in a very modern pared down bottle. So that has kept her name in our minds. She died in her late 80s still working and when Karl Largerfeld took over the house in 1983 he spent the following 35 years cleverly reworking all her classic design So this timelessness is not just about the perfume.
Put simply she tapped into something all fashion houses try to access…effortless cool with her “less is more,” styling mantra it was all about attitude. Looking cool without trying too hard ……oh this Russell, I just threw it on.
Part 2
RUSSELL LINKS TO HISTORY CORNER
“Coco Chanel was a total fantasist and a pathological liar” - I think we need to expand that out with some rich academic depth. Caryn, what sort of bollocks did she spout?
CARYN
She was embarrassed about her poor upbringing and lied about it. She said she was affluent and her dad moved to America. Sadly she was raised in an orphanage by nuns. Her father placed her there after her mum died. This must have been deeply traumatic should someone in the public eye have to reveal their heartbreak? I think she was canny and re-invented her past to create a new identity.
I say she was ahead of her time and doing what all fashion houses do today create fantasies today ….the top photographer, the beautiful model, the campaign set in a magical location, not to mention the amount of digital work done on the photograph after it is taken. The model will get whiter teeth, bigger eyes, any blemishes removed. It’s a glamourous con and we willingly engage in that fantasy of an idealised self. Fashion campaigns today are full of pretence and artifice so what’s the difference?
And yes she lied about her age, knocking 10 years off her age. Like all woman today, she knew how harshly she would be judged as an older woman, in the cutthroat world of business. And we are still in the dark ages when it comes to female entrepreneurs. One study carried out in 2019 revealed only 12.5 per cent of fashion companies in the Fortune 1000 were female led.
One interesting thing that prevented Coco from being found out about her age back then as well as other details… is on that her birth certificate, her name was mistakenly recorded Chasnel. And of course Coco is a nickname her real name was Gabrielle. And her correct birthdate a whole 10 years earlier in 1883.
Coco maintained the mystery about her family in many ways, she distanced herself from some of her siblings, but her favourite brother got an allowance of 3000 francs per month to make sure he didn’t appear poor. By modern day standards, that’s £1712.32 per month.
But of course there is controversy and an underbelly to our central character her designs may have empowered women but she apparently was an awful boss when her workers went on strikes before the second world war. She fired 3000 of them three years later for asking for more money and better hours. Just like to flag up that many of our favourite brands today are still paying very low wages to garment workers in the global south. Sorry to break it to you but if it doesn’t say fair trade on our labels, then we could be supporting very poor business practice too.
Part 3
RUSSEL PULLS OUT ANOTHER DOSSIER WITH A NASTY EAGLE
Never a good sign when there’s a Nazi looking eagle on the front, but if I’ve learnt anything on Evil Genius it’s to always keep an open mind. Do you agree Caryn, even though there’s a Nazi eagle on Coco’s file we should keep an open mind?
Caryn, did she actually shack up with a Nazi?
CARYN
The Nazis invaded France in and took Paris in June 1940. Coco fled to the countryside but August 1940 returned to live at the Ritz hotel, where lots of German officials were camped. Hmmm. Baron Hans von Dincklage, was sent specifically to mobilise the French fashion industry towards the war effort. The soldiers needed uniforms.
He was 43 and she was 56, and they started a relationship. Many reasons have been given for this dalliance in the first instance. That she was looking after her own interests but also that of the French textile industry, that she needed his help to save her nephew who had been captured by the Nazis, that she was spying for Winston Churchill and given that she did have meetings with Churchill, that she was actually spying for the Germans.
RUSSELL
Could she have fled? She wasn’t trapped. What could she have done, Caryn?
CARYN
Chanel was never happy with the deal she had struck with her Jewish partners over the perfume franchise. So she used Nazi occupation laws, (prohibiting Jewish people from owning a business) to attempt full ownership of the company in which she only had a small percentage.
There was zero loyalty to Pierre and Paul Wertheimer who owned the majority stake in the business of 70%. So as the perfume was raking it in, she showed her true colours. She did not succeed because Wertheimer brothers had cleverly transferred ownership to a non-Jewish French businessman who kept it safe for them and today, the Wertheimer family control the entire Chanel empire.
CARYN
Coco grew up in a convent in France at a time when antisemitism was rife. La France juive (Jewish France), was a best selling book of the time and argued for the exclusion of Jews from French society. The author - Eduord Drumont - also founded an antisemitic political newspaper in 1892 that coined the slogan ‘France for the French’ The modern day equivalent of (‘Make America white again/sorry Great Again. Sadly on the verge of becoming the first Jewish PM of France in 1936, Andre Leon Blum was dragged from his car and savagely attacked.
In the run up to WW2, nationalist groups spread campaigns against Jewish people (and immigrants) via magazines / newspapers. Placards appeared in Strasbourg demanding ‘the expulsion of all Jewish immigrants. Some French right-wingers were even happy when France fell to Nazi Germany in 1940. Calling it a ‘divine surprise’.
RUSSELL
Caryn - How damaging has this been to the house of Chanel?
CARYN
It hasn’t. Chanel created a brand name that would lead the way in licencing: Designer brands all make their make money on bags shoes sunglasses and perfume. The shows and flagship stores are simply part of the marketing. Today the Chanel brand ranks very highly in Global online sales.
Sorry to burst your bubble Russell but Fashion is built from a house of smoke and mirrors - glossy exterior but no one sees into the back room, the cutthroat behaviour or the treatment of garment workers and let’s not forget other fashion brands also have questionable pasts…
HUGO BOSS the German designer, joined the Nazi party in 1931, and created uniforms for Nazis.
ADIDAS founder Adolf (“Adi”) Dassler was a member
of the Nazi party from 1933. Their business made boots for soldiers and then their factory turned to making weaponry for the war effort.
LOUIS VUITTON family members supported the puppet government led by Marshal Philippe Petain (the French PM of Vichy France) and made money from their business dealings with the Germans.
And so we come to the vote...Watch the show to find out. Was Coco Chanel EVIL or GENIUS