Karl Lagerfeld

Karl Lagerfeld died on 19 February 2019 after thirty-six years directing Chanel fashion. The house divided his responsibilities between Virginie Viard for fashion collections and Eric Pfrunder for fashion image.

Fendi formalised its highest craft programme as Haute Fourrure in Paris in 2015, extending Lagerfeld’s fur experimentation into couture-scale presentations and Roman monument shows. He remained responsible for womenswear, fur and couture until his death in February 2019.

Fendi launched Haute Fourrure in Paris in July 2015, formalising a couture-level programme built around the house’s fur atelier. The line later adopted the broader Couture title as its material scope expanded.

Chanel established the annual Métiers d’art programme in December 2002 to give the acquired maisons d’art a dedicated commercial and presentation vehicle. The format placed couture-level handwork into an off-calendar, ready-to-wear structure and later became an international destination show.

Silvia Venturini Fendi joined the main studio in 1992 and assumed formal direction of accessories and menswear in 1994. Lagerfeld continued to lead womenswear and fur within a parallel authorship structure that placed apparel and leather goods under distinct creative control.

Karl Lagerfeld returned to Chloé as artistic director in 1992. His second tenure revived fluid slip dresses and art-derived print through a brighter 1990s register before Stella McCartney’s appointment in 1997.

Rome’s Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna hosted Un Percorso di Lavoro for Fendi’s sixtieth anniversary and Lagerfeld’s twentieth year at the house. The exhibition placed the maison’s fur, leather and atelier processes inside a national art museum.

Rome’s Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna hosted Un Percorso di Lavoro for Fendi’s sixtieth anniversary and Karl Lagerfeld’s twentieth year at the house. Garments, fur panels and atelier processes were presented inside a national art museum, giving the house’s craft a formal institutional setting later revisited for its 2026 couture presentation.

Lagerfeld’s ready-to-wear remit became public in March 1984, extending his authority beyond couture. The dual structure made ready-to-wear the commercial engine while couture retained its atelier and image function.

Karl Lagerfeld assumed artistic direction of Chanel in January 1983 after an appointment announced the previous September. He reunited couture and ready-to-wear under a public creative authority and built the house into a multi-calendar system of fashion, accessories, image and spectacle.

Chanel announced Karl Lagerfeld as artistic director on 15 September 1982, effective the following January. The appointment concluded a decade of divided couture and ready-to-wear leadership and introduced the first external head of fashion since the founder.

Fendi’s 1977 launch of women’s ready-to-wear expanded Lagerfeld’s remit beyond fur. The line carried the atelier’s material experimentation into clothing while the house grew through film, licensing and international retail.

Fendi launched women’s ready-to-wear in 1977, extending a house previously centred on fur and leather into a complete fashion wardrobe. The first collection was introduced through Jacques de Bascher’s film Histoire d’Eau.

Chloé’s current archive dates Karl Lagerfeld’s exclusive design appointment to January 1975, after more than a decade within Aghion’s multi-designer studio. The change consolidated collection authorship while retaining the flou, named garments and artistic collaborations developed during the earlier period.

Karl Lagerfeld was promoted to head designer in 1966 after entering Chloé’s collective studio around 1963 or 1964. The promotion marks the shift from shared authorship towards his dominant creative role, preceding the exclusive contract that made him the house’s sole designer in January 1975.

Working with the five Fendi sisters and the Roman fur atelier, Lagerfeld stripped weight and formality from fur, introduced vivid colour and graphic construction, and established the double-F “Fun Fur” mark as the house’s new visual code.

Appointed by the five Fendi sisters in 1965, Karl Lagerfeld transformed fur through colour, lightness and graphic construction, created the double-F “Fun Fur” mark and later directed women’s ready-to-wear and Haute Fourrure until his death in 2019.

Karl Lagerfeld joined Chloé’s multi-designer studio around 1963 or 1964 and gradually became its dominant designer. His first tenure moved from flou dresses and named picture garments to the trompe-l’œil collections presented for Spring/Summer 1983 and 1984, ending when he left for Chanel.

Karl Lagerfeld worked at Balmain as a design assistant from about 1955 to 1958 after winning the coat category of the International Wool Secretariat competition.