Personal Life in the Later Years

Chanel's personal life in her final decades was marked by increasing isolation despite constant activity. The romantic relationships that had characterized her earlier years were replaced by a solitude that seemed both chosen and imposed. At the Ritz, where she continued to maintain her residence, she lived surrounded by memories and attended by a small circle of employees who provided companionship as well as service.

Her daily routine became ritualistic. She would arrive at rue Cambon each morning, ascending the mirrored staircase to her apartment-studio where she worked on collections. Lunch was often taken alone or with one trusted associate. Afternoons were spent in fittings, adjusting designs with the obsessive perfectionism that had always characterized her work. Evenings at the Ritz followed similar patterns—solitary dinners, early retirement, little social life.

The few friendships she maintained were complex and often transactional. She supported various artists and writers financially, but these relationships rarely developed into genuine intimacy. Her caustic wit and tendency to dominate conversation made her a difficult companion. Those who remained close often did so from a mixture of admiration, history, and financial dependence.

Her relationship with money in these years was paradoxical. Despite enormous wealth, she lived relatively simply, wearing her own designs exclusively and maintaining the same routines for decades. Yet she could be extraordinarily generous, supporting former employees, giving lavish gifts, and maintaining various dependents. Money seemed less important for what it could buy than for the security and control it represented.

The question of succession increasingly preoccupied observers if not Chanel herself. She trained assistants but trusted none with real authority. She spoke vaguely of the house continuing after her death but made no concrete plans. This failure to prepare succession reflected both her inability to imagine the house without her and perhaps a unconscious desire that it should not survive her.