The Great Fashion Debate: Chanel vs. Dior

Gabrielle "Coco" Chanel and Christian Dior were arguably the two most influential fashion designers of the early 20th century. Of course, they couldn't have been more different, both in their aesthetics and philosophies about women and fashion. In the 1950s, when Dior's popularity had peaked and Chanel returned to Paris to reclaim her throne, fashionable women were divided between Dior's New Look, at once refreshing and nostalgic, and Chanel's practical simplicity.


As a feminist, I must begin by saying that I have a great respect for Chanel's contributions to fashion. She introduced styles that enabled working women to be chic without throwing practicality to the wind. Chanel had a true sense of what women needed and took inspiration from menswear and the lower classes to supply it in the form of suits, simple dresses and costume jewelry.

However, as a fashionista, I actually have a strong dislike for Coco Chanel's aesthetic. I credit Chanel with making fashion boring. I must admit that I'm drawn to the impractical beauty of fashion that Chanel strongly opposed. Chanel didn't believe in extravagant, artistic creations. Instead, she replaced her fine jewels with costume gems and borrowed ideas from the aforementioned groups, whose wardrobes were far less interesting than the upper-class women of the time.

Of course, fashion hasn't remained completely yawn-worthy for the last decade. After World War II, while the Nazi Chanel was hiding out in Switzerland, Dior debated the only style that the fashion industry recognizes as revolutionary, rather than evolutionary. It was dubbed "The New Look" by Harper's Bazaar editor-in-chief Carmel Snow. Women, who had been thrust into more masculine roles in wartime while the men fought overseas, readily accepted his new femininity. I must agree that I believe it to be one of the most beautiful fashion looks of the twentieth century. I certainly would've adopted it quickly and gladly don similar ensembles today.

However revolutionary Snow and her contemporaries may have considered Dior's silhouette to be, I question their logic. The "New Look" was actually a step backwards for women. The desired hourglass silhouette, not dissimilar to that of the WWII pin-up icons the GIs had fallen in love with, threw women back into the corsets that Paul Poiret had liberated them from at the beginning of the decade. Post-war nostalgia certainly fueled this longing to return to the standards of the previous century and the feminist movement in the 1960s proved that this old-fashioned femininity didn't have a lasting influence. Despite my decidedly feminist mentality, I like to simply view Dior's New Look as a beautiful fashion moment.

Maybe I don't have to choose. Chanel was a curse for the fashion industry, yet played a key role in the women's movement. Dior was a fashion fantasy creator, but was an accessory in the societal movement to take women out of the workforce. So let's just take their contributions at face value: both deserve our respect and our skepticism.