Back in 1954, Coco Chanel dreamed up the design for a little black jacket. Today, 58 years later, the jacket is one of the most iconic pieces known to the fashion community. In an effort to document this piece of history, Chanel’s current creative director Karl Lagerfeld joined forces with former Vogue Paris editor Carine Roitfeld to develop a coffee table book featuring the jacket worn in different ways on different actors, models, musicians, and more. What a fascinating idea, to document a timeless design using faces very specific to our current time.
The success of the idea was not solely limited to a coffee table book as a medium. The photographs have been produced and arranged into full-blown museum exhibits, traveling around the world from Tokyo to New York to Taipei to Hong Kong. Today marks the Little Black Jacket exhibit’s opening in London, where it will run for free admission at the Saatchi Gallery until October 28. London’s local Chanel boutiques are also paying homage to this style by featuring contemporary little black jackets in shopfront windows. If you, like many of us, cannot make it to London to catch the exhibit, the book retails on Amazon for a list price of $98, and is a worthwhile investment for any fashion or photography fan.
Author: Charlotte Pratt Photo Credit
