Coco Chanel (58 page)

30

Latecomers were locked out, and that even included the editor of the Parisian fashion bible,
L'Officiel de la couture
. Every newly painted gilt seat was filled; toward the back, the staff members of French, British and American
Vogue
stood on their chairs to see. The crush, the suspense were incredible. The first girl appeared carrying her number and walked slowly past the audience. The next girl walked just as sedately. Already, it was abundantly clear that Dior's triumph of a few years earlier was not about to be repeated. One commentator noted acidly:

The atmosphere was icy. Glances were exchanged. And when, at last, the show finished, there was a moment's dreadful silence. A pensive and tentative-looking Gabrielle stood in her old position at the top of those mirrored stairs. Traditionally, she had permitted twenty or so of her most privileged friends and admirers to sit on this, the “spine of her house,” to watch the show unfold. This time, unaware of the old protocol, many who hardly knew Gabrielle had crammed themselves onto those notoriously uncomfortable yet much sought “seats.”
Vogue
would write:

Then, with the last dress, there was a sudden hubbub and the audience was in a rush to get away. Only a handful of friends remained, including Hervé Mille, Maggie van Zuylen and Gabrielle's faithful
première
, Madame Lucie. They strained to congratulate Gabrielle, but she was devastated, silent. While her lawyer would say later, “She accepted defeat with a great deal of dignity, a dignity based on self-confidence,” she also implored Madame Lucie to tell her, had she lost her touch? Unquestionably, memories of Gabrielle's war record were in the air. Nonetheless, while a good number in the fashion firmament had—to a greater or lesser degree—themselves been collaborators, they would have ingratiated themselves quickly enough if they'd thought Gabrielle's new collection passed muster.

Meanwhile, one of those whose judgment may in part have been based on criticism of her war record was Lucien François. François, a journalist from
Combat
, whose power enabled him to make or break reputations, and who was secretly and passionately loathed, insinuated that Gabrielle had had a facelift, and dismissed her: “With the first dress we realized that the Chanel style belongs to other days. Fashion has evolved in fifteen years . . . Chanel has become a legend idealized in retrospect.” He ended with the acid comment: “Paris society turned out yesterday to devour the lion tamer . . . we saw not the future but a disappointing reflection of the past, into which a pretentious little black figure was disappearing with giant steps.”
²

While the French press described the beauty of the mannequins, and declared that Gabrielle was still a “personality,” it also weighed in with the opinion that, as a designer, she was finished. The response by the British press was just as negative. The headlines announced: “Chanel Dress Show a Fiasco—Audience Gasped!” One article said, “Once you're faded it takes more than a name and memories of past triumphs to put you in the spotlight.” In a daze, Gabrielle said quietly, “The French are too intelligent, they will return to me.”
³
Afterward, she blamed no one for the show's failure except the press—particularly the French press. There was, however, to be one major exception: the United States.

The outgoing Parisian editor of American
Vogue
, Bettina Ballard, was being assisted by Susan Train, a young American who had come from New York three years earlier in a “cold and not that glamorous post-war Paris.” Sitting in the
Vogue
offices, in the magnificent place du Palais-Bourbon, with the experience of hundreds of collections now behind her, she recalls that day in 1954:

With the photographer Henry Clarke, Susan was amazed “to discover the mythical Chanel was still alive,” and remembers that:

Susan recalls how “all Paris was in a buzz, and that practically every designer had paid tribute to Gabrielle's comeback by trying to anticipate what she would do with a little Chanely look somewhere.” But when the day of Gabrielle's show arrived, “it was a nightmare. It was like going back in a time capsule . . . Dior had changed everything.” Indeed, quite apart from the collection itself, Dior had transformed the idea of a couture collection from a sedate and rather stately masque, to a fast-moving, stylish and seductive show. In addition, he had decorated his svelte models with a brilliant display of accessories; something that Gabrielle had never done. And now here she was, stubbornly ignoring Dior's effect on the tenor and tempo of fashion. Susan Train remembers:

Bettina Ballard told her young colleagues that, actually, it was no worse than some of Gabrielle's collections in the late thirties, and suggested a photo shoot to see what they thought. Accordingly, that evening, Susan went with Bettina Ballard and Henry Clarke to Chanel, where they selected pieces from the collection. Bettina chose three or four of these and sent Susan down to the boutique with instructions to gather up whatever jewelry she could lay her hands on. (There was apparently very little to choose from.) She recalls Bettina Ballard's familiarity with Gabrielle, saying, “She had an intimate knowledge of how she dressed, and had lent Bettina clothes.” Bettina encouraged her young colleagues with the comment, “There was always something in a Chanel collection that was worth it,” and Susan describes her “picking out that suit. She just knew it was going to start a whole new thing.”
⁵

Susan says that there was an American manufacturer, Davidol, who had continued making Chanel suits throughout the war, and on into the fifties: “how much American women loved them . . . And the new one was easy, because it was so comfortable and yet elegant.” She continues:

This was the navy suit Bettina Ballard had Henry Clarke photograph and Marie-Hélène Arnaud wear. It was midcalf (Dior's highly fashionable couture was only just below the knee), and made of jersey, with an easy skirt with pockets, a semifitted open jacket and a white lawn blouse topped off by a pert straw boater. This was Gabrielle's version of the Chanel suit she had initiated before the war. In 1954, to those who could see it, the suit gave an overwhelming impression of insouciant, youthful elegance, and Gabrielle was to continue perfecting it for the rest of her life.

The other two costumes Ballard selected for the
Vogue
photo shoot were worn by Suzy Parker, the magnificent, red-headed American, then perhaps the highest-paid model in the world. One dress was in a draped and clinging rose wool jersey, while the other was a mad, strapless evening dress.
Vogue
described this as “tiers of the most modern of fabrics, bubbly nylon seersucker in bright navy-blue, with huge full-blown roses attached.” Gabrielle explained to the magazine how she was now looking beyond the couture: “I will dress thousands of women. I will start with a collection . . . because I must start this way. It won't be a revolution. It won't be shocking. Changes must not be brutal, must not be made all of a sudden. The eye must be given time to adapt itself to a new thought.”

 

Maggie van Zuylen's daughter, Marie-Hélène, who had married Baron Guy de Rothschild, had helped Gabrielle find her new models. They were, like Marie-Hélène Rothschild, well-bred society girls, who knew how to “carry” clothes. Young women such as the Comtesse Mimi D'Arcangues, Princesse Odile de Croÿ, Jacqueline de Merindol, and Claude de Leusse. They were all subjected both to the hours of “posing” for Gabrielle, and the accompanying advice on life and love: “There is a time for work and a time for love. That leaves no other time” was a much repeated adage. Gabrielle was ambivalent about these girls. While she liked to know about their private lives—who they were seeing, the details of their affairs—she also criticized them for going out with men who weren't particularly rich. They defended themselves by saying that their boyfriends were handsome and fun. Gabrielle was not convinced.

The girls later described how Gabrielle's instinct for promotion led her to give them Chanel couture for most of their wardrobe. Their connections meant that they “went everywhere, and she knew it. People called us ‘les blousons Chanel.'”

With Gabrielle's lacerating tongue, she would say, “Yes, my girls are pretty, and that's why they do this job. If they had any brains, they'd stop.” She also claimed that rather than needing beauty, her models must possess poise and style in the way they carried themselves: “Only the figure, the carriage, the ability to walk exquisitely.” Several of them happened to be some of the most beautiful girls in Paris. Gabrielle believed her models were mistaken in not using their looks more ambitiously, and in their goals, which were love and happiness. Their lack of ambition irritated her, and she charged them to “take rich lovers.” Her own failure to remain with any man meant that Gabrielle was obliged to believe the independence she had worked so hard for was more important than enslavement to a vain search for happiness.

While Gabrielle would, on occasion, say that she didn't really like her models, she also became much attached to a handful of them, most famously, Marie-Hélène Arnaud. Indeed, for some time after Gabrielle's return to couture, this beautiful young woman was, apparently, almost “like her shadow.” Some thought their relationship was too intense. When Marie-Hélène arrived at Chanel, she was seventeen, and according to Lilou Marquand loved Gabrielle

Gabrielle encouraged Marie-Hélène to have steady relationships—but was also very possessive. Marie-Hélène said to Lilou Marquand, “You understand, I have problems.”
⁷
The young woman was herself quite possessive of Gabrielle and, for a time, almost acted as an intermediary between the little court, soon dancing attendance upon her mistress and the outside world.

The gossips, meanwhile, assumed that Gabrielle's feelings for Marie-Hélène went beyond simple affection. The other models believed, too, that they were lovers. One of them says, “At any rate that's what was being said in the
cabine
(the model's dressing room). It didn't shock me at all, I thought it was very natural.”
⁸
Gabrielle stoutly denied the rumors, saying, “You must be crazy—an old garlic like me. Where do people get those ideas from?” This was not the first time such rumors had been abroad about Gabrielle, and over the years, they would persist. Neither does one believe that Gabrielle really cared that much. For more than fifty years she had been the subject of gossip, and she had never let it make any difference to the way she chose to lead her life. And while
Women's Wear Daily
journalist Thelma Sweetinburgh would say that Gabrielle's bisexuality “was a sort of known thing,” a young French woman on the staff of American
Vogue
at the time remembers, “I had to go once to see her, and was told to be careful. I believed, and all others did, too, that Chanel was bi-sexual. One assumed it to be the case. British and French laws were different. It wasn't illegal in France and people were just less fussed about it really.”
⁹