Iconic fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld died Tuesday in Paris. He was 85.
Chanel announced his death Tuesday morning, The New York Times reports. Rumors swirled about his health after he was absent from his Chanel show in late January due to what the company described as tiredness.
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The German designer was creative director of the brand since 1983 and that of Fendi since 1965. He was rarely seen without his dark glasses, a silver ponytail, black jeans and fingerless gloves, making him an instantly recognizable figure.
The head of LVMH, which owns rival house Louis Vuitton, said the fashion world had “lost a great inspiration.”
“We have lost a creative genius who helped to make Paris the fashion capital of the world, and Fendi one of the most innovative Italian houses. We owe him a great deal: his taste and talent were the most exceptional I have ever known,” Bernard Arnault, the chairman and CEO of LVMH, said in a statement.
“The death of this dear friend deeply saddens me, my wife and my children. We loved and admired him deeply.”
While presenting Lagerfeld with the Outstanding Achievement Award at the British Fashion Awards in 2015, Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour described Lagerfield as the “soul of fashion.”
“More than anyone I know, he represents the soul of fashion: restless, forward-looking and voraciously attentive to our changing culture,” Wintour said at the time.
Also a photographer, publisher and author, Lagerfeld was known for his nonstop work ethic.
“Ideas come to you when you work,” he said backstage before a Fendi show at age 83.
Born in Hamburg, Germany, Lagerfeld won a womenswear design competition in 1954. He got his start in Paris working under Pierre Balmain in the 1950s and was hired by Fendi in 1967 as a consultant director, responsible for modernizing the Italian design house’s fur lines. His transition to Chanel, founded by Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel, made him one of the most famous and celebrated designers of the 20th and 21st centuries.
The designer achieved such a level of global fame that a $200 Karl Barbie doll, created in collaboration with Mattel, sold out in less than an hour in 2014.
He is known not for creating a new silhouette in fashion, but in a creating a new kind of designer: the shape-shifter — someone who reinvents a heritage brand like Chanel “by identifying its sartorial semiology and then wrestling it into the present with a healthy dose of disrespect and a dollop of pop culture,” as New York Times reporter Vanessa Friedman wrote in his obituary.
“Chanel is an institution, and you have to treat an institution like a whore — and then you get something out of her,” he said, according to the obituary.
Donatella Versace called Lagerfeld a genius on Tuesday. “Karl your genius touched the lives of so many, especially Gianni and I. We will never forget your incredible talent and endless inspiration. We were always learning from you,” she wrote on Instagram.
Victoria Beckham also shared her condolences. “So incredibly sad to hear this. Karl was a genius and always so kind and generous to me both personally and professionally,” she wrote. “RIP.”
