Karl Lagerfeld, arguably the world’s most iconic designer and undoubtedly the most prolific, has died in Paris. He was 85.
In a seven-decade career as fashion’s ultimate free agent, Lagerfeld created collections simultaneously for the celebrated houses of Chanel and Fendi, in addition to his signature label, at a pace without rival in the luxury industry. For Lagerfeld, to design was to breathe, “so if I can’t breathe, I’m in trouble,” he often quipped to journalists who were astonished by his inexhaustible work ethic and his insistence that he would never retire.
In fact, his creative output seemed only to become more bountiful in his golden years, a period during which his extravagant runway productions at the Grand Palais in Paris achieved a staggering level of theatrical opulence. At a cost of millions of dollars per season, the events surpassed the mundane boundaries of a fashion show to become something more like large-scale performance art – media spectacles where Lagerfeld, as both gifted designer and visual provocateur, could best demonstrate his ability to interweave the superficialities of fashion with matters of great depth, while also parading seemingly endless ways to keep Chanel’s classic tweeds looking modern and fresh.
