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  • Published: 24 October 2012
  • ISBN: 9780141036854
  • Imprint: Penguin General UK
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 544
  • RRP: $24.99

Chanel

An Intimate Life




The controversial story of the fashion icon who starred in her tumultuous era

Coco Chanel was many things to many people. Raised in emotional and financial poverty, she became one of the defining figures of the twentieth century. She was mistress to aristocrats, artists and spies. She broke rules of style and decorum, seducing both men and women, yet in her work expected the highest standards. She took a 'plaything' and turned it into a global industry which defined the modern woman. Filled with new insights and thrilling discoveries, Lisa Chaney's Chanel provides the most defining and provocative portrait yet.

  • Published: 24 October 2012
  • ISBN: 9780141036854
  • Imprint: Penguin General UK
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 544
  • RRP: $24.99

About the author

Lisa Chaney

Date: 2003-05-13
Lisa Chaney has lectured and tutored in the history of art and literature, made TV and radio broadcasts on the history of culture, and reviewed and written for journals and newspapers, including the Sunday Times, The Spectator and the Guardian. Her biography of Elizabeth David was published in 1998 to critical acclaim.

Lisa Chaney has lectured and tutored in the history of art and literature, made TV and radio broadcasts on the history of culture, and reviewed and written for journals and newspapers, including the Sunday Times, the Spectator and the Guardian. She is the author of two previous biographies: Elizabeth David and Hide-and-Seek with Angels: The Life of J. M. Barrie.

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Praise for Chanel

Chaney's research is laudable, uncovering fresh details of Chanel's well-trodden rag trade to riches story

Evening Standard

Chaney ably explores the complexities and inner life of her subject

The Times Literary Supplement

Elegant, meticulously researched and packed with details

Prima

An unflinching examination of the historically inscrutable designer

Vogue

Chaney is adept at elucidating Chanel's paradoxical character. A nuanced account of a contradictory, complex, quite extraordinary life

The Times Higher Education Supplement