可可·香奈爾，原名加布里?！は隳螤?，曾被法國前文化部部長稱為20世紀法國永垂不朽的3位名人之一。盡管她出身低微，童年不幸，性格不羈，可是憑著絕對的自信和敏銳的直覺，她最終成為了時尚王國無可爭議的傳奇女王。她，就是時尚的化身；她，讓女人的生命怒放！

Coco Chanel wasn’t just ahead of her time， she was ahead of herself. If one looks at the work of contemporary fashion designers as different from one another as 1)Tom Ford， 2)Helmut Lang， 3)Miuccia Prada， 4)Jil Sander and 5)Donatella Versace， one sees that many of their strategies echo what Chanel once did. The way， 75 years ago， she mixed up the vocabulary of male and female clothes and created fashion that offered the wearer a feeling of hidden luxury rather than

6)ostentation are just two examples of how her taste and sense of style overlap with today’s fashion.

Chanel would not have defined herself as a feminist—in fact， she consistently spoke of femininity rather than of feminism—yet her work is unquestionably part of the liberation of women. She threw out a 7)life jacket， as it were， to women not once but twice， during two distinct periods decades apart: the 1920s and the ’50s. She not only 8)appropriated styles， fabrics and articles of clothing that were worn by men but also， beginning with how she dressed herself， appropriated sports clothes as part of the language of fashion. One can see how her style evolved out of necessity and 9)defiance. She couldn’t afford the fashionable clothes of the period—so she rejected them and made her own， using， say， the sports jackets and ties that were everyday male attire around the racetrack， where she was climbing her first social ladders.

By the late ’60s， Chanel had become part of what she once rebelled against and hated—the Establishment. But if one looks at documentary footage of her from that period， one can still feel the 10)spit and vinegar of the fiery peasant woman who began her fashion revolution against society by aiming at the head， with hats. Her boyish “11)flapper” creations were 12)in stark contrast to the 13)Belle Epoque 14)millinery that was in vogue at the time， and about which she asked， “How can a brain function under those things?” Something that Chanel can never be accused of is not using her brain. Her sharp mind is apparent in everything she did， from her savvy use of logos to her deep understanding of the power of personality and packaging， even the importance of being copied. And she was always quotable: “Fashion is not simply a matter of clothes. Fashion is in the air， born upon the wind. One 15)intuits it. It is in the sky and on the road.”

It is fitting， somehow， that Chanel was often photographed holding a cigarette or standing in front of her famous Art Deco wall of mirrors. Fashion tends to involve a good dose of 16)smoke and mirrors， so it should come as no surprise that Gabrielle Chanel’s version of her life involved a multitude of lies， 17)inventions， cover-ups and revisions. But as Prada said to me: “She was really a genius. It’s hard to pin down exactly why， but it has something to do with her wanting to be different and wanting to be independent.”

Certainly her life was unpredictable. Even her death—in 1971， at the age of 87 in her private quarters at the Ritz Hotel—was a 18)plush ending that probably would not have been predicted for Chanel by the nuns in the Aubazine orphanage， where she spent time as a ward of the state after her mother died and her father ran off. No doubt the sisters at the convent in Moulins， who took her in when she was 17， raised their eyebrows when the young woman left the 19)seamstress job they had helped her get to try for a career as a 20)cabaret singer. This stint as a performer led her to take up with the local swells and become the backup mistress of Etienne Balsan， a playboy who would finance her move to Paris and the opening of her first hat business. That arrangement gave way to a bigger and better deal when she moved on to his friend， Arthur (“Boy”) Capel， who is said to have been the love of her life and who backed her expansion from hats to clothes and from Paris to the coastal resorts of Deauville and Biarritz. One of her first successes was the loose-fitting sweater， which she belted and teamed with a skirt. These early victories were similar to the clothes she had been making for herself—women’s clothes made out of Everyman materials such as jersey， usually associated with men’s 21)undergarments.

Throughout the ’20s， Chanel’s social， sexual and professional progress continued， and her eminence grew to the status of legend. By the early ’30s she’d been courted by Hollywood， gone and come back. She had almost married one of the richest men in Europe， the Duke of Westminster; when she didn’t， her explanation was， “There have been several Duchesses of Westminster. There is only one Chanel.”

In fact， there were many Coco Chanels， just as her work had many phases and many styles， including Gypsy skirts， over-the-top fake jewelry and glittering evening wear—made of crystal and jet beads laid over black and white 22)georgette 23)crepe—not just the plainer jersey suits and “l(fā)ittle black dresses” that made her famous. But probably the single element that most ensured Chanel’s being remembered， even when it would have been easier to 24)write her off， is not a piece of clothing but a form of liquid gold—Chanel No. 5， in its Art Deco bottle， which was launched in 1923. It was the first perfume to bear a designer’s name. By the time Katharine Hepburn played her on Broadway in 1969， Chanel had achieved first-name recognition and was simply Coco.

可可·香奈爾不僅僅只是領先于她的時代，她還領先于她自己。如果你看看當代那些時尚設計大師們的作品，例如湯姆·福德、海爾姆特·朗、繆西婭·普拉達、吉爾·桑達和唐娜泰拉·范思哲，盡管他們的作品風格各異，但是你仍能發(fā)現(xiàn)他們的許多理念都不過是在重復香奈爾曾經(jīng)的策略。早在75年前，她就已經(jīng)將男裝和女裝的元素相混合，并創(chuàng)造出了一種全新的時尚，令穿衣者體驗到一種低調(diào)的奢華，而不是闊綽的炫耀——僅從這兩方面我們就能看出，她當時對潮流的品位和感覺同今天的時尚是多么地

一致。

香奈爾從不認為她自己是名女權(quán)主義者——實際上，她總是在談論女性特質(zhì)而非女權(quán)主義——然而她的作品卻無疑是女性解放運動中的一部分。在間隔數(shù)十年的兩個非常時期，她曾不止一次而是兩次向女性拋出了救生衣：一次在20世紀20年代，另一次在20世紀50年代。她不僅挪用了曾屬于男裝的風格、面料和款式，同時還用自己的著裝打扮將運動裝變成時尚語言的一部分。你能看出她的風格不單源自實用，同時也含反叛元素。因為買不起當時的流行服飾，于是她就反抗潮流，利用男士們?nèi)粘Ｔ谫愸R場所穿戴的運動夾克和領帶來創(chuàng)造自己的潮流，并以此向她的社會階梯邁出了第一步。

到了20世紀60年代末期，香奈爾已經(jīng)成為時尚主流階層的一分子，而這一階層卻是她曾一度極其反抗和憎恨的。但是，如果你觀看她當時錄制的紀錄片，你依然能感受到這位火爆的農(nóng)家女孩的活力四射。她拿傳統(tǒng)的帽子開刀，并由此發(fā)起了反抗社會的時尚革命。她所設計的略帶男孩子氣的“反傳統(tǒng)式”作品與當時流行的“法國美好時光式”女帽截然不同，而對此她曾質(zhì)問道：“一個人的腦袋在那種玩意兒下面該如何思考呢？”對于香奈爾來說，你決不能指責她沒頭腦。她所做過的一切事情無不彰顯了她敏銳的思維——從她對商標的精明運用到她對個性和包裝，甚至對被仿制的重要性的深刻認識中都能體現(xiàn)出來。而她也常常語出驚人，被人津津樂道：“時尚不僅僅與服飾有關。時尚就彌漫在空氣中，隨風而生。你可以憑直覺感覺到它的存在，它既飄浮在天際，也行走在路上?！?/p>

香奈爾在拍照時常常夾著一支煙，或者站在她那著名的裝飾派藝術風格的鏡墻前，不知怎的，這種感覺出奇地適合她。時尚總需要不少煙霧幻象來陪襯，所以加布里埃·香奈爾的生活充斥著謊言、虛構(gòu)、掩飾和修正也不足為奇。不過普拉達曾對我說：“她真的是個天才。你很難說清原因，不過這可能與她想要與眾不同、想要獨立自主有關。”

當然，她的人生是變化難料的。即使是她的逝世——1971年87歲高齡時，在法國麗茲酒店她的私人套房中離世——也是極其舒適的，關于這點可能是那些在奧巴辛孤兒院收養(yǎng)過她的修女們想象不到的。當她母親去世，父親又離家出走時，她曾以國家受監(jiān)護人的身份在那里長大。17歲時，她又被漠林市修道院收留。毫無疑問，當她放棄了她們幫她找到的藉以謀生的裁縫工作而轉(zhuǎn)做一名夜總會歌手時，修女們都驚訝萬分。然而這份表演工作卻讓她結(jié)識了不少當?shù)氐念^面人物，后來她還成為了花花公子艾提安·巴勒松的情人之一。巴勒松愿意資助她搬去巴黎并開始她的第一筆帽子生意，可是他們的約定卻讓步于另一筆更大也更好的交易——她轉(zhuǎn)投了他的朋友亞瑟·賈柏（綽號“男孩”）的懷抱。據(jù)說賈柏是她一生的摯愛，他一直資助她擴展事業(yè)，從帽子生意到服裝生意，從巴黎到多維爾和比亞里茨的海濱度假勝地。她最初的杰作之一是寬松毛衣的設計，她將其束上腰帶并與裙子相搭配。這些早期的成功之作與她為自己設計的衣服極為相似——以諸如平針織布之類的普通面料來制作女裝，而這些面料通常是用來制作男士內(nèi)衣的。

在整個20世紀20年代，香奈爾的社會地位、個人魅力和事業(yè)都蒸蒸日上，而她的傳奇色彩也與日俱增。到了30年代早期，她往返于好萊塢，成為了那里的寵兒。她差一點就嫁給了歐洲最富有的人之一——威斯敏斯特公爵，可是她卻沒有。對此，她解釋說：“威斯敏斯特公爵夫人有很多，而香奈爾只有一個?！?/p>

實際上，可可·香奈爾也有許多個，正如她的作品分為許多時期和許多風格一樣，包括了吉普賽裙裝、大量的仿真珠寶和華麗閃亮的晚禮服——在黑白色的喬其紗上覆蓋水晶和黑玉珠串——而并非只有讓她藉以成名的較為素淡的運動裝和“黑色小禮服”。不過也許最讓香奈爾被世人銘記的，或者在當時更容易將她的名聲毀于一旦的，不是服裝而是一種液體黃金——香奈爾五號。它于1923年問世，被盛裝在極具裝飾派藝術風格的瓶子中。它是世界上第一瓶以設計者的名字命名的香水。當1969年凱瑟琳·赫本在百老匯扮演她的時候，香奈爾已經(jīng)贏得了廣泛的認可——“可可”，僅此。