By useename
I would say that the designs of Coco Chanel was revolutionary for her time. She started her business in 1910, a time where women had a lot of limitations, also when it came to what they should wear. As I understand it women were only supposed to look beautiful, even if that meant not being comfortable. Typical for this time period is the corset, which Chanel wanted to get rid of.
“April 1955” by Dovima-2010 is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0
Chanel stated that luxury had to be comfortable, otherwise it wasn’t luxury. The thing that’s unique about her design approach is exactly that, emphasizing comfort for women. She also borrowed elements of mens wear in her clothing, which was new to the fashion industry. What I can see is that she combined femininity with being comfortable and practical, instead of choosing one or the other. It seems to me that Chanel didn’t just design clothes to make clothes, she wanted to make a change.
As you probably already understand, Coco Chanel is situated in fashion design. Fashion design can be said to be defined as the art of applying design, aesthetics and natural beauty. Chanels clothes shows just that.
“Golden Riveria/Riveria Romp/Tea Dance” by mjbthird is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
The Chanel suit is said to be one of the most iconic fashion items of all time. The little black dress is also a rather famous term in the fashion industry. To this day pretty much every designer has had a go at it, and it is still in style. But it was in fact Coco Chanel that introduced this dress to the world. The colour black is typically worn to funerals, but Chanel made it into something you can also wear to be stylish in the evening.
Her business competes with other high fashion clothing businesses. I say it’s high fashion because of its exclusivity, uniqueness and the fact that it’s made with quality materials and has a high cost. A lot of other more mass-producing stores do try to copy her look. They may use cheaper materials and can sell the same type of style for less money. Although I don’t think that is such a threat to Chanel, it is a type of competition.
Chanel is such a big name in the fashion industry. When I think of Chanel I think of the words exclusive, classy, elegant, and something that cost a lot of money. Like I have already stated, it’s unique and timeless. And even though there are a lot of brands that may be described the same way, I would argue that they aren’t the same.
I would say that the thinking and design of Coco Chanel was quite innovative at the time. Her designs was something brand new, and met the needs of people that they may not even have known that they had before she gave them the idea. Her clothes were easier for women to wear than the corsets, but still preserved the beauty. In my opinion she combined comfort, practicality, beauty, and style.
Photos: https://search.creativecommons.org/search?q=coco%20chanel%20suit&provider&li<&searchBy
Link to case: https://www.biography.com/fashion-designer/coco-chanel
Making sense of art and design industries 