香奈儿

可可·香奈儿：时尚和文化的传奇领军人物 2021.05.07 Melita Scanlan 课程导读 从平平无名的缝纫女工到名闻天下的时尚界女王，可可·香奈儿用坚强和独立成就了自己。她的独立坚韧、大方自信以及与众不同的时尚态度都非常值得我们学习。那她的生平故事具体用英文如何描述？本节课中，Melita老师将为你一一介绍，赶快进入课程开始学习吧！ 英文原文 E02 Coco Chanel Hello everyone and welcome to YLYK English speaking. It’s Melita here with you. Today, we’ll be continuing on with our theme of inspirational women and discussing about the fashion icon – Coco Chanel. This amazing woman has had a huge influence on fashion, which continues to this day. Her iconic clothing, handbags, jewellery and perfume represent style today and have done ever since she entered the fashion world in 1915. A fashion icon is a person who is very well known as being highly fashionable. They have an individual personal style. Coco Chanel is so popular and her work is so well-recognised that we could also say that she is a cultural icon. A cultural icon is a symbol, picture, name, face, person, building or other image that is easily recognisable. It represents an object or idea with great cultural significance to a wide cultural group. When we see the interlocking ‘C’s that are Coco Chanel’s trademark, shoppers associate the product with French design and high-quality. Another example of a cultural icon would be the Eiffel Tower in Paris. We associate this beautiful example of architecture with all things French. Coco Chanel’s incredible success is even more amazing when we consider her humble beginnings and the lack of opportunities she had in her youth. When we talk about someone as having humble beginnings, it is a more polite way of saying that someone had a very poor childhood and grew up in very difficult circumstances. In Chanel’s case, we could say ‘Chanel was raised in an orphanage (a home for poor children whose parents could not care for them). Despite these humble beginnings, Chanel went on to achieve lasting world-wide success.’ The girls were given a skill by the nuns who raised them – sewing. As their choice of fabric was limited to the black and white material, they nuns wore, Chanel spent her days creating little dresses for dolls from this plain cloth and became very skilled. This was the beginning of a resourcefulness which would bring huge success during her whole life. If someone is resourceful, it means they can think of quick and clever ways to make the best of a difficult situation. We often talk about women during war time as being very resourceful. For example: ‘With very little food, she managed to produce meals for her family every day. It seems she made meals out of almost nothing. She was a very resourceful woman.’ When she was older, a friend helped her open her own fashion shop. Chanel’s designs were revolutionary. If someone or something is revolutionary, it means they are involved in causing a complete or dramatic change. We could describe Anthony Atala (a doctor who specialises in building artificial body organs) as revolutionary. For example: ‘Dr Atala is revolutionary who will revolutionise medicine. He builds internal body organs (like livers and kidneys) and will save the lives of thousands of people in need of these body parts.’ Coco Chanel’s clothing designs were so important, because they revolutionised women’s fashion and levels of comfort. In the early part of the 1900’s, women wore corsets. These were a tight, stiff undergarment worn around women’s waists to give them a slim figure. How uncomfortable! Chanel introduced suits and dresses made of a soft, machine-made fabric – jersey. It was a brave choice, as this material had traditionally only been used in the making of men’s underwear! This jersey material encouraged freedom of movement for women and an active lifestyle. This was greatly appreciated by women during this time, as women were working during and after the war as nurses, bus drivers and factory workers. They needed practical outfits that they could easily move in. In the 1920’s, Chanel took her thriving business to new heights. If a business is doing very well, we say it is thriving. When you take something to new heights, it means that you make it better than before, you improve it. The opposite of a thriving business would be a struggling business (which would be a business not making much money and not doing well). If you know of someone who has taken over a struggling business and made it profitable (where it is making a lot of money), you could say ‘He has taken a struggling business which employed five people, to a thriving business, working 365 days a year and employing over 1000 people.’ If a business reaches new heights, it is doing better than it ever did before. We could say of Coco Chanel’s growing business: ‘By introducing her first perfume, ‘Chanel No. 5’, Chanel took her thriving business to new heights.’ Chanel proudly said: ‘Perfume is the unseen, unforgettable, ultimate accessory of fashion.’ She also said (perhaps a little harshly!): ‘A woman who wears no perfume has no future.’ Chanel’s most successful design was her LBD (Little Black Dress). Black was a colour that had traditionally been associated with funerals. Thanks to Chanel’s designs, black was now transformed into a colour perfect for evening wear. Chanel was truly a visionary to design the LBD. A visionary is a person who thinks about or plans the future with imagination or wisdom – a person who has a clear idea about how the future should look. We often talk about great managers or leaders as visionaries. We might say ‘Jim was a visionary leader who leads our company in a very successful direction for many years.’ The LBD or Little Black Dress was so successful, largely because it was introduced in the 1930’s during the Great Depression era, a time of great financial hardship when women needed affordable fashion. Chanel said: ‘I have enabled the non-wealthy to walk around like millionaires.’ The shape of many of the clothes we wear today was greatly influenced by Coco Chanel, the designer who started life making doll’s clothes from small pieces of nun’s skirts. Coco Chanel is a truly inspirational woman. Thank you so much for listening to this podcast today. Hopefully, you now have a range of words you can use to describe hugely successful inspirational women, or even someone who inspires you personally! Let’s review the key expressions before we finish today. Coco Chanel started producing her fashions in the early 1900’s, but her influence and popularity was and still is so great that she has become a fashion icon and a cultural icon (a person well-known for her style and for her cultural importance through her high-quality French designs) . Chanel’s products, her clothing, perfume and accessories are iconic. This means that they are characteristic of an icon – representing style and French glamour. Chanel’s humble beginnings (meaning, poor childhood) was where she learnt to sew. Using only pieces of the nun’s simple black and white clothing to make small dresses for her dolls, is where Chanel learnt to be resourceful. A resourceful person will think of quick and clever ways to make the best of a difficult situation. This resourcefulness was a huge part of Chanel’s personality and helped her to achieve so much during her lifetime. Chanel’s clothing designs were revolutionary (meaning, they encouraged a complete and dramatic change)! Her ideas revolutionised women’s fashions. Women went from wearing tight, uncomfortable dresses to clothing made of soft jersey material, which allowed them to move easily and be more active. Chanel took her thriving business to new heights by introducing her perfume in the 1920’s. By designing the LBD (Little Black Dress) in the 1930’s, Chanel was a visionary (a person with a clear idea of how the future should look). She allowed women who were not wealthy to feel glamourous, by designing an item in black - a colour which had previously only been worn at funerals. An LBD is still an important glamour item for women today. Chanel’s strong belief in the importance of women and fashion is reflected in one of her most famous quotes: ‘Women should be two things – classy and fabulous.’ Coco Chanel was a bold and passionate woman and we have many quotes from this great lady, but my favourite is one I would like to end this podcast with today: ‘The age of a woman is not important: you can be wonderful in your 20’s, amazing in your 40’s and stay fabulous for the rest of your life.’ Goodbye for now everyone!