Coco Chanel Facts, Worksheets, Early Life & Steps to Success For Kids (2024)

Coco Chanel (Gabrielle Bonheur Chanel ) is an icon of style, one of the most famous fashion designer in the world, and the founder of the brand of clothes and perfumes Chanel. The style created by Chanel personifies the whole epoch – elegance and minimalism. Chanel was an extraordinary person – she mostly disliked people and was ready to go over their heads for the sake of her success and profit.

See the fact file below for more information on the Coco Chanel or alternatively, you can download our 20-page Coco Chanel worksheet pack to utilise within the classroom or home environment.

Key Facts & Information

EARLY LIFE

• Gabrielle Chanel, the future celebrity, was born in 1883 (although she claimed she was born 10 years later) in a poor family to a market trader and a rural carpenter. When Gabrielle was born, her parents were not married, and she was their second daughter. Her name was given in honor of nurse Gabrielle, who helped the baby to be born.
• Gabrielle’s mother, Jeanne Devol, died when the girl was only eleven years old. Chanel was raised in an orphanage and was taught to sew.

FIRST STEPS TO SUCCESS

• Gabrielle loved to sing and even performed in a cabaret. At that time, she received the nickname Coco, because her favorite songs were “Ko Ko Ri Ko” and “Qui qua vu Coco”. In one of these cabarets, she met a rich retired officer, Etienne Balsan, who soon proposed that she move to his castle in Paris.
• Remembering her sewing lessons, she realized that she wanted to become a fashion designer (making women’s hats, dresses, and underwear), and with the help of a young English entrepreneur, Arthur Capel, in 1910 was able to open her own hat shop in Paris – it is still located opposite the Ritz Hotel on Cambon Street, 31.
• The fashion for a tanned skin happened because of Coco Chanel. It happened by accident – in 1923, Gabrielle tanned during a cruise and appeared in Cannes. The society, at that time was attentive to the appearance of the woman, and immediately followed the example of Chanel.
• Chanel created a line of jewelry that was a conceptual innovation, as her designs and materials incorporated both costume jewelry and fine gemstones. This was revolutionary in an era when jewelry was strictly categorized into either fine or costume jewelry.
• Coco Chanel made popular little black dresses which women could wear all day long, complementing them with various accessories. She proved that black can be elegant and Chanel started making little black dresses in wool for the day and in satin for the evening.
• The merit of Coco Chanel is the creation of unique handbags. “I’m tired of wearing reticulums in my hands, and besides, I’ve always lost them,” said Gabrielle in 1954. A year later, she presented a small rectangular handbag on a long chain. As a result, women were able to carry a bag, conveniently hanging on the shoulder.
• The famous perfume “Chanel number 5” appeared in 1921. Its creator was a Russian emigrant perfumer Ernest Bo. The uniqueness of these perfumes is that, before Chanel, women’s perfumes did not have complex odors. Coco was an innovator and offered women the first synthesized perfume. It has been said that the perfume got its name from the series of scents that Beaux created for Chanel to sample—she chose the fifth, a combination of jasmine and several other floral scents that was more complex and mysterious than the single-scented perfumes then on the market.
• By 50, Chanel was rich and famous. The collections she created at that time stand out for their free spirit and fantasy. When the Second World War began, Chanel closed all salons because people did not care about fashion at that time.

DEATH AND LATER LIFE

• In September 1944, at the initiative of the Committee on Public Morals, she was arrested because of her connection with German officer Hans Günther von Dunklägl. Soon she was released with the help of Churchill but with the condition that she will leave France. Chanel went to Switzerland and lived there for almost ten years.
• However, in 1953, Coco Chanel decided to re-open her salon in Paris. At that time Chanel was already 70 years old. On February 5, 1954, the Chanel House was inaugurated. Critics were merciless and smashed her new collection. However, Chanel was deaf to criticism – it took her only three years to return to the height of glory.
• Chanel was never married and had no known children, but she looked after her elder sister’s son, André Palasse, following her sister’s suicide.
• On January 10, 1971, Coco Chanel died at the Ritz Hotel at the age of 87 from a heart attack. She was buried in Lausanne, Switzerland. Five lions are carved on the top of her gravestone.
• After her death in, Chanel’s couture house was led by a series of different designers. This situation stabilized in 1983 when Karl Lagerfeld became chief designer.

HERE IS A LIST OF COCO’S BEST QUOTES

• “A girl should be two things: classy and fabulous.”
• “Dress shabbily and they remember the dress; dress impeccably and they remember the woman.”
• “Nature gives you the face you have at twenty. Life shapes the face you have at thirty. But at fifty you get the face you deserve.”
• “The best things in life are free. The second-best are very expensive.”
• “A woman with good shoes is never ugly.”
• “Fashion changes, but style endures.”
• “Don’t spend time beating on a wall, hoping to transform it into a door.”
• “Look for the woman in the dress. If there is no woman, there is no dress.”
• “Dress like you are going to meet your worst enemy today.”
• “A woman who doesn’t wear perfume has no future.”
• “Fashion is not something that exists in dresses only. Fashion is in the sky, in the street, fashion has to do with ideas, the way we live, what is happening.”

Coco Chanel Worksheets

This is a fantastic bundle which includes everything you need to know about Coco Chanel across 20 in-depth pages. These are ready-to-use Coco Chanel worksheets that are perfect for teaching students about Coco Chanel (Gabrielle Bonheur Chanel ) who is an icon of style, one of the most famous fashion designer in the world, and the founder of the brand of clothes and perfumes Chanel. The style created by Chanel personifies the whole epoch – elegance and minimalism. Chanel was an extraordinary person – she mostly disliked people and was ready to go over their heads for the sake of her success and profit.

Complete List Of Included Worksheets

• Coco Chanel Facts
• French fashion designer
• Famous quotes
• Fashion Pioneer
• Who Was Coco Chanel?
• Global Brands
• The design skills
• Inspired by Coco Chanel
• Chanel’s secrets
• Magnificent Coco

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Link will appear as - KidsKonnect, February 25, 2020