Chanel Makes History in Havana

Since Havana is going to host Chanel’s Cruise Collection fashion show on May 3, a lecture entitled “History of Chanel, Woman and Brand: An Academic Approach” was given on Wednesday at St. Geronimo College.

Professor Carmela Spinelli, a specialist on art history and fashion at Savannah College of Art and Design in the U.S., explained the origins of the Chanel brands by airing the attractive story of its creator, Mademoiselle Gabrielle Chanel, as well as describing the influence of her time in her designs.

Spinelli labeled Chanel as “irreverent, rebel and controversial”, the genuine expression of a time that changed the course of history, when women stopped wearing corsets and joined the world’s technological revolution by driving bicycles and cars.

The specialist underscored that Mademoiselle Gabrielle began to design hats in 1910 and she expressed the simplicity she was looking for, a rupture with the voluptuousness that characterized the designs from the late 19th century.

In 1918 she was already known as Coco Chanel and set up shop on Cambon Street in Paris. In 1921 she opened a boutique with clothes, hats, accessories, and she later included jewelry and perfumes. On that same year, she launched what eventually became the bestselling perfume in history, Chanel No. 5, after Charles Beaux took the designer 88 samples with different aromas, but she handpicked the fifth due to its essences of orange flower, jasmine and sandalwood, among other scents.

Over the years, Chanel became internationally famous by collaborating in theater plays and movies, but she closed her stores in 1939 due to World War II because she said that it wasn’t the right time for fashion.

In 1954 Coco Chanel was back in the fashion business and created the classic “small black dress”, a piece described by professor Spinelli as the epitome of Chanel’s style. The male elements in her designs, as well as the use of chains as accessories and her iconic bag 2.55, were just some of her expressions of rebelliousness.

On May 3, Havana’s Prado is set to be the venue of the fashion show by German designer Karl Lagerfeld, creative director of the haute couture house, who has chosen Cuba as an inspiration for his latest Cruise Collection, a theme initiative that has taken Chanel from Paris to Venice and from New York to Dubai.

Source: www.caribbeannewsdigital.com