Karl Lagerfeld, iconic fashion designer and creative director of luxury brand Chanel, passed away on Tuesday morning after battling ill health for several weeks. He was 85 years old.
France's Closer magazine reports that he was admitted to hospital in Paris, France on Monday evening and passed away this morning. The cause of death is not yet known.
Here are 5 things you may not have known about Karl Lagerfeld:
- He was born in Hamburg, Germany on 10 September 1933
- He started his fashion career at 22 as an assistant to Pierre Balmain after winning a design competition. And started his freelance career three later. As the years went on, his fame in the fashion industry rose further.
- He first found real success in the mid-1960s with Chloe, the fashion label now owned by Switzerland's Richemont and to which he was connected off and on until 1997.
- He was offered the job at Chanel in 1985, but was two-minded about the offer after numerous friends warned him not to take the job, but eventually conceded. During his at Chanel, Lagerfeld helped to produce up to eight collections for the brand a year, much to the excitement and enjoyment of fashion fans across the world. He was also the creative director for Fendi and he also worked on his eponymous fashion label.
- He referred to himself as a "fashion nymphomaniac" and was searingly critical of anyone he considered "not trendy". "I'm a kind of fashion nymphomaniac who never gets an orgasm," he said in 1984, asked about what he felt after a fashion show.