Otto Karl Lagerfeld German fashion designer, 10 September 1933–19 February 2019; born in Germany.
Lagerfeld started his career in the fashion industry in the 1950s, working for a number of famous design houses, including Balmain, Patou, and Chloé, before joining Chanel in 1983.
He was Chanel’s creative director from 1983 until his death, overseeing all facets of the fashion house’s creative output. Including collection design, advertising campaigns, and window displays.
Karl Lagerfeld played a big part in revitalizing the Chanel brand and helping it restore its position as one of the top fashion brands on the planet.
He was the creative director of the Italian fur and leather products fashion label Fendi in addition to owning his own namesake fashion company. Throughout his career, he collaborated with a variety of people on a spectrum of fashion and art projects.
Lagerfeld made a name for himself thanks to his unusual white hair, black eyeglasses, fingerless gloves, and high, starched, detachable collars.
Early Life of Karl Lagerfeld
Karl Otto Lagerfeldt received the name Karl Lagerfeld in Hamburg, Germany. It is generally acknowledged that the well-known fashion designer was born on September 10, 1933. Despite the fact that he has never revealed his exact birthdate.
He removed the “t” from the end of his last name early in his career to make it sound “more commercial.” He received a lot of recognition for his ongoing inventiveness.
Condensed milk was introduced to Germany by Christian Lagerfeld, the father of Karl Lagerfeld, who went on to become wealthy. Karl was raised in a rich environment along with his older sister, Martha, and a half-sister, Thea.
The Lagerfeld household promoted intellectual pursuits. Elizabeth, his mother, was a talented violinist, and discussions about religion and philosophy frequently took place over the dinner table.
The Lagerfelds relocated to a rural region of northern Germany during the 1930s, when Adolf Hitler came to power, where, as Karl would later recollect, he was cut off from any awareness of the Nazis.
Early on, Lagerfeld displayed a keen interest in fashion and design. As a child, he routinely tore pictures out of fashion magazines. He was known for making fun of other people’s school clothes.
But it wasn’t until Lagerfeld was a teenager and his family had returned to Hamburg that he truly immersed himself in the world of high fashion.
Career Beginnings
The courageous 14-year-old Lagerfeld made the decision to move to Paris with the help of his parents after concluding that Paris was where his destiny lay.
He had barely been employed there for two years when he submitted a number of designs and fabric samples for a design competition.
He met another winner who would go on to become a close friend, Yves Saint Laurent, after taking first place in the coat category.
Soon after, Lagerfeld began working for the French fashion house Pierre Balmain full-time, initially as a junior assistant and eventually as an apprentice.
The youthful designer worked in the difficult post for three years. He accepted a position as design director with another fashion house until eventually going it alone in 1961.
Soon after, Lagerfeld began producing excellent work, creating collections for Chloe, Fendi (where he was hired to manage the brand’s fur line), and other brands.
Lagerfeld rose to fame in fashion thanks to his avant-garde, trendy looks. But Lagerfeld also had a fondness for the past. And he frequently browsed flea markets in search of vintage bridal gowns to dissect and reinvent.
Karl Lagerfeld First Recognition
Karl Lagerfeld received his first honor from the Pierre Balmain design house in 1955. He won a coat design competition, and Balmain hired him for three years. Later, he began working with Jean Patou, another renowned French fashion designer.
As a freelancer, Lagerfeld began working for Chloe in 1964 and quickly rose to fame with his colossal spring collection.
Lagerfeld was given the opportunity to work with the renowned Italian fashion house Fendi after earning enormous praise for his work with them.
It was then that Lagerfeld cemented his status as a style icon and began work on the iconic Fendi logo.
Rumors of Karl Lagerfeld’s Health
When Chanel’s 2018 Resort Show was held in Paris rather than its customary remote location. Rumors of Karl Lagerfeld’s sickness first began to spread in 2017.
At the time, several tabloids made assumptions about Lagerfeld’s health based on his clumsy walking and gripping his godson Hudson Kroenig‘s arms as he went.
Rumors regarding Lagerfeld’s ill health began to spread in 2019 after he missed the Chanel Haute Couture presentation and Virginie Virard. The brand’s head of the creative studio took his place.
Karl Lagerfeld just felt fatigued, the fashion house said at the time, according to the public. The designer was, however, fighting pancreatic cancer, according to insider sources. a close friend of Chanel said:
“He hadn’t gone on about his illness but battled it very bravely. Karl was very proud of his fitness and healthy living, so the pancreatic cancer came as a huge shock.”
He was taken to the American Hospital of Paris on February 18 and died the next morning as a result of pancreatic cancer complications.
What is Pancreatic Cancer?
In 2017, reports about Karl Lagerfeld’s sickness initially surfaced. The pancreas is an organ in the abdomen that is situated behind the bottom portion of the stomach.
Pancreatic cancer affects the tissues in the pancreas. The main signs and symptoms of pancreatic cancer are jaundice, itchy skin, blood clots. Dark urine, bloating, weight loss, and middle back pain.
Although the primary etiology of pancreatic cancer is unknown. It is thought that a number of variables raise the likelihood of getting the disease.
Smoking, being overweight, diabetes, chronic pancreatitis, and inherited disorders caused by gene mutations are a few of them.
Due to its challenging early detection, pancreatic cancer typically has dismal survival rates. With the proper therapy, which typically entails surgical excision of the disease, complete remission of pancreatic cancer is nevertheless achievable.
Be the first to comment