After more than three decades of research, this report ends up in an unauthorized book.
Chanel No. 5 is the most famous perfume in the world, the only pajamas of the actress Marilyn Monroe, the engine of wealth of the designer Gabrielle Chanel and an almost fetishistic object that will be 100 years old in 2021 surrounded by a smell of success but also controversial.
His story fascinated the French writer Marie-Dominique Lelièvre, author of books like “Saint-Laurent, bad boy” or “Chanel & Co: Las amigas de Coco”, which now publishes in Spanish “El Nº 5 de Chanel, biography no. authorized ”.
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The book came to light after nearly 30 years of research that guided Lelièvre through all the ins and outs of the brand and its designer, as one of the curiosities of this perfume is that it represents the history of the Chanel empire in itself.
Marie-Dominique Lelièvre dedicated herself to writing this interesting story in a book. Photo EDH / EFE
Its creation dates back to a 1921 alliance between the Franco-Russian perfumer Ernest Beaux and the seamstress, and the name is the main topic of debate among historians and fans.
The version in which he was baptized with the number of the show that Chanel liked the most or the story she offered about why five was her lucky number are some of the rumors denied by Lelièvre’s research.
In this case, based on a high proportion of roses and jasmine, perfume aficionados will have to assume that there are multiple possibilities in the choice of name because the reality remains a mystery.
Clean scent
“Something very special, that does not stain, that smells very nice, if not, it’s over, it’s chaos,” were the instructions Chanel gave to Beaux, probably without knowing that the sample she chose was actually a missing perfume. used to be. from Imperial Russia, Rallet No. 1, created by the Romanov perfumer shortly before the outbreak of the revolution.
This perfume is a classic in the fashion world. Photo EDH / AFP
The French, an orphan with a miserable childhood, almost illiterate, and with her beauty and cunning as their only weapons, managed to create an empire from scratch, but in the 1920s, when sewing was all that really mattered to her she didn’t she could imagine that this perfume would become a universal success and make her rich.
The money came much later because in 1924 he entered into an alliance with the brothers Pierre and Paul Wertheimer and with Théophile Bader, one of the founders of Galeries Lafayette, to set up the company Les Parfums de Chanel.
Convinced that registering a trademark in her name was already an honor, she settled for 10% of the capital, while the Wertheimers won 70% and Bader the remaining 20%.
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His little quirk, in a tiny lab-like bottle, quickly became the first bestseller in history, especially in the United States.
By the time Chanel realized her mistake, it was too late and she felt ripped off. Her maneuvers to regain more rights to her creation began in the 1930s and reached their peak during the Nazi occupation (1940-1944), which, like so many other members of the French elite, was complacent.
The dark years of the occupation
Anti-Semitic Chanel, Chanel employee, Spy Chanel, high German army with a bloody curriculum … There are many charges against the designer’s dark past in those years and there are also those who try to justify it.
Lelièvre confesses that she had to stop her investigation when she found a letter in the national archives, signed by the designer herself, in which she betrayed herself when she tried to get her mark back from the Wertheimers, Jews.
Sometime later, the author confesses to EFE, “without understanding or justifying her,” she knew how to accept the gray areas of her heroine, who, as other testimonies tell us, maintained a clear anti-Semitism throughout her life.
Coco Chanel has always been involved in controversies. Photo EDH / AFP
“I would have liked to show that it was not true so that it wouldn’t affect the look of my character, but unfortunately it is,” admitted Lelièvre, who believes that despite all this dark phase, the general interest in the designer is even greater. makes.
At the same time, she attracts a devoted friend, who has always had a generous attitude towards working women, with whom she felt identified.
Probably thanks to the intervention of a senior official in the French government, Chanel has left that past behind and legally reclaimed a larger percentage of the profits.
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At the age of 70, he reopened his brand and revolutionized fashion again with the creation of his famous tweed suit, another emblem of the house.
Today, the company is far from the designer’s quality and craftsmanship, and Lelièvre wonders if this perfume is not yet the only luxury element left in Chanel.
Would the creator rebel against the company that became her company, like most of her opponents?
“No, Chanel was a merchant, she had a very clear sense of practicality and, unlike me, who am a dreamer, she would most likely have adapted to this new world,” the writer assumed.