Coco Chanel: An Intimate Life

by Lisa Chaney

  The year 1916 saw the twin disasters of Verdun and the Somme. Verdun, the longest battle of the war, gained no advantage for either side and was responsible for more than half a million casualties. The Battle of the Somme was notorious for its first-day British casualties of 58,000, one third of whom lost their lives. One liaison officer, for whom the romance of war had long since disappeared, felt it was nothing more than “a dreary massacre, a stupefying alternation of boredom, fatigue and fear.”5 In February 1917, Jacques-Emile Blanche said to his friend the writer André Gide:

  Huge portentous things are happening above our heads, through the branches of the trees in my garden which fall under Olivier’s axe, and will replace coal in the winter 1917–18. Boy [Arthur] Capel, our friend, the great coal importer, mobilized by England and France at St Dominique Street [the Ministry of Defense], the man our tomorrow depends on… said to Rose, “Have your cook come up, I will make her understand her duty. From next month onwards things will be very difficult. Stock up. Do without what is not absolutely necessary. Around June, it will be almost famine. As for next winter, even if peace is signed, you will have to stay in bed and suck your thumb.6

  The effects of the Russian Revolution were now playing out their relentless course; on March 15, 1917, Tsar Nicholas II abdicated. In early April, to the great relief of the Allies, America at last entered the war, and on April 26, Lenin arrived in Russia to agitate more unrest. Then, with the second October revolution, Russia withdrew from the conflict. Meanwhile, the French commander in chief, Robert Nivelle, had argued for a massive onslaught on the German lines, which was to bring about a French victory in forty-eight hours. Many high — ranking officials disagreed, but the prime minister insisted.

  The massive attack on the German positions was eventually supposed to link up with the Allied forces. From the beginning, the plan was dogged by delay and information leaks, and by the time the battle was launched, the Germans had had plenty of time to prepare their defenses. The offensive was an unmitigated disaster for the French, who suffered 187,000 casualties. On the western front, the slaughter was appalling. Thousands died every day, and the people of France were in a poor state of morale.

  Arthur had been appointed to the new Allied War Coal Commission, but he was also unofficially liaising between the British and French politicians and the military. In addition, by the spring of 1917, when the Allied position had never been more in doubt, he published Reflections on Victory, in which he was confident of just that. To many, this looked misguided. While respecting the move toward democracy, Arthur abhorred the centralizing state. In its place he proposed a “Europe-wide Federation, giving full autonomy to every corporate body, region, people and race.” This federation could be seen as a forerunner to the present-day European Union and indeed was recognized as such by one of those later to become one of its architects.7

  Reflections on Victory was reviewed in serious journals, and despite Arthur’s antifederal critics, the book broadened his reputation within the circles of power. Those who had known him only as a rich playboy-businessman — made even richer by the war — now looked at him with more discernment.

  Few, however, shared Arthur’s optimism. The war had become a crushing burden, leaving many incapable of enthusiasm for anything. Even with the long-awaited arrival of the American troops in Paris, “the crowd, especially the women, were weary, every spark gone; wanting only the quickest possible end to this dreadful war.”8 The catastrophic failure of the Nivelle offensive proved the last straw for some, and French soldiers now mutinied, refusing any longer to go over the top to certain death. The mutinies weren’t quelled till the end of May, by the new commander in chief, Marshal Philippe Pétain.

  While the slaughter continued at the front, in Paris in that May of 1917, the Ballets Russes gave the premiere of a new work, Parade, in aid of war victims. It was the only Ballets Russes work put on in Paris during the conflict and was by invitation only. Diaghilev’s carefully chosen audience consisted of a selection of society figures, prominent experimental musicians and artists, and a good number of the bourgeoisie, who he knew liked the frisson of dabbling in the avant-garde. Diaghilev also invited Gabrielle.

  However much bolstering and covering up had been necessary during the growth of industrialism in France, prewar Belle Epoque society had muddled along, shoring up the old social structures and attitudes. The Belle Epoque had clung to its belief in the value of permanence and tradition, which in turn depended upon an overriding belief in the idea of authorities. For years before the war, a number of artists had reacted to this hypocrisy by searching for a language to express their sense of alienation from the modern world. Now, as the war dragged on, the initial belief of the population that a secure world would survive the hostilities was physically and metaphorically being smashed to smithereens. Diaghilev’s new ballet mirrored aspects of this instability, and was to strike yet one more blow at the certainties of the past.

  The ballet was young Jean Cocteau’s brainchild, and he provided the scenario and libretto. Léonide Massine was choreographer; the ungovernable and cheerfully eccentric Eric Satie, initially distrustful of Diaghilev—“Will he try to screw me? Probably”9—was persuaded to write the music; and Picasso, already the most famous modernist painter, agreed to create the sets. These became a cubist cityscape with high-rise blocks of flats. But the most radical elements were two figures (a French and an American manager) costumed as larger than life-sized cubist sculptures.

  While the audience’s response was nothing like that of the first night of The Rite of Spring, it was still one of shock, and the crowd became raucous in its disapproval. In part this was because, aware of what was going on at the front, the audience expected something soothing and patriotic. Instead what they got was an unconventional experiment. To many, it was an exercise in “banality and superficiality,”10 and some of the audience made their way toward the stage, yelling for the curtain to be lowered. A horse appeared wearing a cubist mask, cavorted about, then danced, knelt down and bowed. “The audience clearly thought the dancers were mocking their protests and completely lost their heads; they yelled, ‘Death to the Russians!’ ‘Picasso’s a Boche!’ ‘The Russians are Boches!’”11

  This was the first ballet ever to be set in the present. In addition, its witty and apparently lighthearted romp through popular culture — the circus; the music hall; the ephemera of everyday life, including fashion, advertising and the cinema — had never before been used as the subject matter for ballet. However, under the guise of frivolity, Parade’s aim was in fact a serious one: an attack on the old authorities.12 Those in the audience who were already embracing avant-garde fashion, popular music and a wider social range of people, believing they were just as worthwhile as the traditional elites and high culture of their parents, understood the ballet’s subversion and applauded.

  Parade wasn’t a great ballet, but it was a seminal artistic work. As the first to push modernism to center stage, it made it part of mainstream artistic culture. Parade’s creators were not only intent on dragging art down from its high-culture pedestal; they believed they had revealed the essential, simple artistic beauty of the mundane and the everyday.13

  Once again, Gabrielle’s presence at an avant-garde event was appropriate: Cocteau’s ballet was at one with her own path. (Their friendship was almost inevitable.) Borrowing from workaday wardrobes and using modest materials, Gabrielle was the designer then showing that a democratization of fashion was possible. And while her daring hints at classlessness were at first taken up only by a wealthy clientele, as time went on, her simple designs and “modest” materials would be transferred from the salons to the streets. All over France, and abroad, women would be able to copy Gabrielle’s styles, allowing more of them than ever before to take part in the game of fashion.

  13. Remember That You’re a Woman

  A few days after the premiere of Parade, the woman then regarded as France’s finest classical actress, Cécile So
rel, gave a dinner to celebrate the ballet, and to which she invited a novel mix of guests, which included Arthur and Gabrielle. Cécile Sorel understood that while Arthur was one of Paris’s most eligible bachelors, Gabrielle’s presence as an avant-garde designer gave her evening greater cachet.

  Sorel’s dinner party would be long forgotten if it hadn’t been recorded by that urbane future novelist the diplomat Paul Morand, who made it his business to attend the numerous Parisian social events during those strange war years. Sorel’s unorthodox guest list included Morand’s boss, Philippe Berthelot, one of the highest-ranking French diplomats; a fashionable artist, the immensely rich and mad Spanish painter José Maria Sert; Sert’s twice-divorced and most unconventional mistress, the Slav patroness and artist’s muse Misia Edwards; the literary gadfly and artist Jean Cocteau; a playboy businessman, Arthur Capel; and his mistress, Gabrielle, a lower-class couturier.

  While Morand’s snobberies had him imply he wasn’t at the dinner and refer to Sorel’s unconventional social mix as “preposterous,” he also noted with interest Gabrielle’s presence. Her achievement of a most unusual thing — the advancement of a couturier from “mere” dress-designer status to the drawing rooms of the Parisian elite — fascinated the novelist in Morand. And while he noted that Gabrielle was the least socially significant person at that dinner, he referred to her as “Coco Chanel, who is definitely becoming quite a personage.”

  The second matter of note about that evening at Cécile Sorel’s recorded by Morand was that both Cécile and Gabrielle had done an outrageous thing: they had cut off their hair. “In the last few days it has become the fashion for women to wear their hair short. They’re all doing it, Madame Letellier [a mistress to the late Edward VII] and Coco Chanel in the lead, then Madeleine de Foucault, Jeanne de Salverte, etc.”1

  Jean Cocteau told Morand that “this fashion was launched for charitable purposes — that all the cut hair is put together… and sold for the benefit of the wounded.” One can only say that this reveals nothing more than how far removed Cocteau was from what these women were thinking. (This we will come to in a later chapter.)

  It has always been said that it was at Sorel’s dinner, in mid-1917, that Gabrielle first met Misia Edwards.2 The two women had actually met a year earlier, in 1916. This meeting would develop into a lifelong friendship, becoming infamously rich in complexity and conflict.

  Misia Edwards is traditionally credited as the person who cultivated Gabrielle, the person who expanded her horizons beyond sportsmen and business. This, however, underestimates Gabrielle herself and the position she had already come to inhabit as the mistress of a cultivated man. First, with so little known about Arthur until now, it has been impossible to appreciate the full extent of his influence upon Gabrielle. Second, as Gabrielle would obscure so much detail of this period in her life, a source used repeatedly for information on her meetings with figures of any cultural note is Misia Edwards’s memoir.3 Misia Edwards was an extraordinary woman of remarkable cultural influence, but she was also a breathtakingly self-absorbed one, and her late-life memoir was written as much as anything with a view to signaling her own part in the development and advancement of numerous twentieth-century artists’ careers.

  While Misia was completely sincere in her belief that Gabrielle’s role in their times was a highly significant one, she also believed that without her, Misia, the world would not have recognized Gabrielle’s gifts, society would not have welcomed her and she would not have become involved with the artists who were making those feverishly creative times. Misia wrote, “One could say that it is easy to help a beautiful diamond to shine. Still, it was my privilege to help it emerge from its rough state, and — in my heart — to be the first person dazzled by its brilliance.”4

  Although Misia was not the first to introduce Gabrielle to any kind of culture, what she was the first to do was introduce her to the core of the Parisian avant-garde. Having said that, these artists were inverted snobs of a high order, and even an introduction by the famed Misia Edwards — muse and patron to so many of them — would not have been enough to gain Gabrielle admittance to their circles. Her own personality and originality would almost certainly have led her to them anyway. Unlike Misia, who was invaluable as a muse and patron, Gabrielle had the character of an artist. Her acceptance within the spectrum of the avant-garde came about, above all, because she was recognized as a kindred spirit.

  Recalling that evening, in 1916, when she first met Gabrielle, Misia would say:

  My attention was immediately drawn to a very dark young woman… She radiated a charm I found irresistible… She seemed… gifted with an infinite grace and when, as we were saying goodnight, I admired her ravishing fur-trimmed red velvet coat, she took it off at once and put it on my shoulders, saying with charming spontaneity that she would be only too happy to give it to me… Her gesture had been so pretty that I found it bewitching and thought of nothing but her.

  The next day I could hardly wait to see her in the rue Cambon… When I arrived, two women were talking about her, calling her “Coco.” I don’t know… but my heart sank… Why trick out someone so exceptional with so vulgar a name?

  Magically the hours sped by… even though… she hardly spoke… That same evening Sert and I went to dine at her apartment… There, amidst countless Coromandel screens we found Boy Capel… Sert was really scandalized by the astonishing infatuation I felt for my new friend… And I myself was rather surprised that a woman I had met the night before could already fill such a place in my thoughts.5

  Misia’s description is borne out in Morand’s novel Lewis et Irène—where Irène bears such a resemblance to Gabrielle — when Morand describes the singular character of his heroine:

  Irène proved very popular. Paris had plenty of businesswomen, but they were talented dressmakers, lucky actresses… who were only looking at generating profits, to establish themselves, to be accepted, to deal with famous men, thus showing the limit of their ambitions… Irène was liked because of her grace, her absence of… pretensions, her direct manners, her simple and imperious mind. She was courted. Lewis was not jealous.6

  When Arthur’s political profile was in the ascendant with the men prosecuting the war, his encouragement and financial backing also continued being a source of stimulation to Gabrielle. But they were also often apart. Arthur was unable to remain faithful, and Gabrielle was becoming more self-reliant.

  Arthur was, like so many, apprehensive about the conflict causing the disintegration of social cohesion, and at this point he felt driven to begin his second book. One of the central planks of this work was the new position of women, and he heralded women’s changed lives, rejoicing that their inferiority had been only an “illusion of the other sex.” His own mistress was acquiring a name as a working woman, and with her growing “equality,” she was the perfect example of just what Arthur was espousing.

  Taking into consideration Gabrielle’s later confidences to Morand about her relationship with Arthur, Morand’s description of Lewis sometimes being unsettled by his mistress Irène’s drive and self-reliance seems understandable:

  He wondered how she could manage to be so self-sufficient. She was never late, received visitors, wrote notes… and it never looked like it cost her anything. Irène’s desk was always clean, tidied up at the end of each morning… Irène left nothing to chance; she used everything.7

  For all Arthur’s energetic open-mindedness and forward thinking, believing a thing and acting upon it with any consistency are all too often different. And living with a New Woman was no doubt far harder than writing about one. In practice, Gabrielle’s equality may sometimes have been too challenging.

  In her post — Second World War conversations with Paul Morand, she would quote Arthur’s advice to her: “Remember that you’re a woman,” and would add, “All too often I forgot that.”8 Arthur’s plea was that Gabrielle be less driven and less cerebral. And Morand has his heroine, Irène, say to Lewis, “Giving u
p working? You saw, I tried, I cannot remain idle… I am an island… something simple, isolated, where you cannot live… Can we go on living like this? It will tear us apart.”9 Although concealing any vulnerability she might feel, Gabrielle had also blossomed and was luxuriating in her new power. Arthur’s words urging her to remember she was a woman would, therefore, have little effect upon her progress. Arthur’s own progress, however, was now to take an unexpected turn. His affairs with other women did not usually unsettle his emotions, but he was about to become absorbed by someone who never forgot for a moment that she was a woman.

  The Honorable Diana Wyndham (née Lister) was the youngest daughter of Thomas Lister, 4th Baron Ribblesdale, who so perfectly exemplified the Edwardian aristocrat in his portrait by John Singer Sargent. Ribblesdale was a soldier, landowner and courtier, and his impenetrably nonchalant style was reflected in his unmistakable hauteur. This was born of confidence in a world that had in fact been under threat for some time. The agrarian wealth of the Ribblesdales and their kind had been undermined by the industrial riches of a new and metropolitan aristocracy, which included families such as Arthur Capel’s. In turn, this metropolitan aristocracy would soon open up its ranks to an even newer variant, in the person of Gabrielle Chanel.

  The children of the traditional upper classes would be the last to grow up in the old world. And many of the generation now being slaughtered in the war appreciated, however incoherently, that great change was in the air. To give a minor example, Lord Ribblesdale’s privileged daughter, Diana Wyndham, was a volunteer ambulance driver, close to the front lines of battle.