"A woman can be over-dressed, never over-elegant." -- Coco Chanel Coco knew very well that style comes not only from apparel, but also from attitude. CHANEL creates apparel, accessories, fragrance, makeup and skin care products that give women and men the freedom to feel and look their best. She was born... On 19 August 1883 in Saumur She created... The little black dress, the beige slingback with black toecap, N°5, the tweed suit, the jersey dress, the chain belt, N°19, the total look, costume jewelry, the topstitched bag with gilt chain, the cashmere cardigan... a business, a style, a spirit. She lived... By day at 31 rue Cambon in Paris, by night at the Ritz, always free, often alone, like all remarkable individuals. She met... Picasso, Stravinsky, Cocteau, the Duke of Westminster, André Malraux, Paul Morand, Churchill, Grand Duke Dimitri Pavlovich, Erik Satie, Jean Cocteau, Raymond Radiguet, Jean Renoir, Salvador Dali, Romy Schneider, Catherine Deneuve... She said... "Luxury is the opposite of vulgarity." "If you want to be irreplaceable, you have to be different. " "Success is made with what can't be learned. " "Elegance is when the wrong side is as beautiful as the right side." "You cannot have fashion out of touch with street life." "Fashion passes, style remains." "Perfume is of the utmost importance. In the words of Paul Valéry: 'A woman wearing the wrong perfume has no future'." "When you give women back their mystery, you give them back their youth." "The poetry of fashion lies in creating illusion." "Nature gives you your face at twenty. Life shapes your face at thirty. But the face you have at fifty is the face you have earned." "Let my legend makes its way in life. I wish it a long one." She died... On January 10, 1971, a few days before the showing of her collection. Bibliography L'Allure de Chanel, Paul Morand, pub. Hermann, 1996. L'Irrégulière ou mon itinéraire Chanel, Edmonde Charles-Roux, pub. Grasset, 1974 and 1995. Le temps CHANEL, Edmonde Charles-Roux, Grasset, 1979. Chanel, Jean Leymarie, Editions Skira Rizzoli, 1987. Chanel solitaire, Claude Delay, pub. nrf Gallimard, 1971. Les bijoux de Chanel, Patrick Mauries, Thames and Hudson, 1993. CHANEL, François Baudot, coll. mémoires de mode, Editions Assouline, 1996. CHANEL Joaillerie, François Baudot, coll. mémoires de marques, Editions Assouline, 1998. Coco Chanel, un parfum de mystère, Isabelle Fiemeyer, pub. Payot, 1999