Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel (1883-1971) was a French fashion designer who revolutionized women’s fashion for nearly six decades, rejecting restrictive 19th-century attire in favor of simple, comfortable designs.
Chanel, raised in poverty and orphaned, became associated with wealthy patrons and with their help opened a millinery shop in Deauville in 1913.
Her innovative use of jersey fabric created a fresh look, winning the favor of wealthy women.
By the late 1920s, her businesses were worth millions and employed over 2,000 people.
Her empire was anchored by Chanel No. 5, a perfume launched in 1921.
Despite legal battles over profits, she made substantial earnings. After a controversial period during WWII, Chanel returned to fashion in 1954, introducing her iconic suit design and other styles.
After her death, her legacy continued to inspire biographical works and influence fashion.
Related: Sherly Sandberg Quotes and Joseph Campbell Quotes.
I have shortlisted below the popular quotes by Coco Chanel.
Top Coco Chanel Quotes
1. “In order to be irreplaceable, one must always be different.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
2. “The best things in life are free. The second best are very expensive.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
3. “Success is most often achieved by those who don’t know that failure is inevitable.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
4. “I don’t do fashion, I AM fashion.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
5. “I don’t care what you think about me. I don’t think about you at all.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
6. “If you were born without wings, do nothing to prevent them from growing.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
7. “The most courageous act is still to think for yourself. Aloud.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
8. “Beauty begins in the moment you decide to be yourself.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
9. “A girl should be two things: who and what she wants.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
10. “A girl should be two things: classy and fabulous.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
11. “Simplicity is the keynote of all true elegance.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
12. “My life didn’t please me, so I created my life.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
13. “There is a time for work, and a time for love. That leaves no other time.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
Best Coco Chanel Quotes
14. “Men always remember a woman who caused them concern and uneasiness.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
15. “You live but once; you might as well be amusing.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
16. “Elegance is refusal.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
17. “Don’t spend time beating on a wall, hoping to transform it into a door.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
18. “Dress shabbily and they remember the dress; dress impeccably and they remember the woman.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
19. “How many cares one loses when one decides not to be something but to be someone.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
20. “There are people who have money and people who are rich.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
21. “Elegance is when the inside is as beautiful as the outside.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
22. “As long as you know men are like children, you know everything!” ~ (Coco Chanel).
23. “You can be gorgeous at thirty, charming at forty, and irresistible for the rest of your life.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
24. “To achieve great things, we must first dream.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
25. “Modesty is the highest elegance.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
26. “A woman can be overdressed but never over elegant.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
27. “The right ingredients can create a legend.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
Inspiring Coco Chanel Quotes
28. “Only those with no memory insist on their originality.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
29. “Keep your heel, head and standards high.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
30. “Luxury must be comfortable, otherwise it is not luxury.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
31. “A woman who cuts her hair is about to change her life.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
32. “The best colour in the whole world is the one that looks good on you.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
33. “It’s not the appearance, it’s the essence. It’s not the money, it’s the education. It’s not the clothes, it’s the class.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
34. “If you are sad, If you are heartbroken, make yourself up, dress up, add more lipstick and attack. Men hate women who weep.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
35. “In order to be irreplaceable, one must always be different- life isn’t about finding yourself, it’s about creating yourself- a girl should be two things: who and what she wants…” ~ (Coco Chanel).
36. “Beauty Should Begin in the Heart and Soul, otherwise cosmetics are useless.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
37. “With four pairs of shoes I can travel the world.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
38. “Everyday is a fashion show and the world is the runway.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
39. “Nature gives you the face you have at twenty; it is up to you to merit the face you have at fifty.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
40. “Good manners on a man are like wearing an exquisite suit. They never go out of style.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
Popular Coco Chanel Quotes
41. “It’s not the rooms, it’s the life you live in them.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
42. “Money for me has only one sound: liberty.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
43. “When I find a colour darker than black, I’ll wear it. But until then, I’m wearing black!” ~ (Coco Chanel).
44. “No elegance is possible without perfume. It is the unseen, unforgettable, ultimate accessory.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
45. “Some people think luxury is the opposite of poverty. It is not. It is the opposite of vulgarity.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
46. “There are rich people, and there are those who have money. They are not the same people.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
47. “I invented my life because I wasn’t pleased with it.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
48. “There is no fashion for the old.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
49. “If I say that I love you but I do want personal time, or if I don’t want to do PDA, it’s not that I have something against you.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
50. “The best accessory for a woman – handsome man!” ~ (Coco Chanel).
51. “J’aime la vie! I feel that to live is a wonderful thing.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
52. “Fashion fades, only style remains the same.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
53. “Nothing goes out of fashion sooner than a long dress with a very low neck.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
54. “I was the one who changed, it wasn’t fashion. I was the one who was in fashion.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
55. “Sin can be forgiven, but stupid is forever.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
56. “Before you leave the house, look in the mirror and remove one accessory.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
57. “My reason for choosing diamonds is that, dense as they are, they represent the greatest worth in the smallest volume.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
58. “Guilt is perhaps the most painful companion of death.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
59. “Nothing makes a woman look so old as desperately trying to look young.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
60. “I consider lace to be one of the prettiest imitations ever made of the fantasy of nature.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
61. “Creativity is the art of concealing your sources.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
62. “I wanted to give a woman comfortable clothes that would flow with her body. A woman is closest to being naked when she is well-dressed.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
63. “Ask me who I don’t dress!” ~ (Coco Chanel).
64. “Strength is built by one’s failures, not by one’s successes.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
65. “Fashion is not simply a matter of clothes. Fashion is in the air, born upon the wind. One intuits it. It is in the sky and on the road.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
66. “Wear perfume wherever you want to be kissed!” ~ (Coco Chanel).
67. “There are no ugly women, only lazy.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
68. “May my legend prosper and thrive. I wish it a long and happy life.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
69. “A woman has the age she deserves.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
Famous Coco Chanel Quotes
70. “A woman without perfume is a woman without a future.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
71. “Fashion is not something that exists in dresses only. Fashion is in the sky, in the street, fashion has to do with ideas, the way we live, what is happening.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
72. “I don’t know why women want any of the things men have when one of the things that women have is men.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
73. “Women have always been the strong ones of the world.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
74. “Hard times arouse an instinctive desire for authenticity.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
75. “Scheherezade is easy; a little black dress is difficult.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
76. “Caring about beauty, it is necessary to start with the heart and soul, otherwise no makeup will not help.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
77. “If a man talks bad about all women, it usually means he was burned by one woman.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
78. “Jump out the window if you are the object of passion. Flee it if you feel it. Passion goes, boredom remains.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
79. “Happiness is the secret of beauty. But who knows the secret of happiness? The wise woman keeps her cosmetics at hand.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
80. “One can get used to ugliness, but never to negligence.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
81. “People laughed at the way I dressed, but that was the secret of my success. I didn’t look like anyone.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
82. “I invented my life by taking for granted that everything I did not like would have an opposite, which I would like.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
83. “All men are children, and if you understand that, a woman understands everything.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
84. “Adornment is never anything except a reflection of the heart.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
85. “A woman needs ropes and ropes of pearls.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
Powerful Coco Chanel Quotes
86. “A woman in love is helpless.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
87. “A woman’s education consists of two lessons: never leave the house without stocking, never go out without a hat.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
88. “Eat less than you think you want, eat with your intelligence, not your stomach. Never get up from the table with an inward, silent apology for being a pig.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
89. “There is nothing worse than solitude. Solitude can help a man realize himself; but it destroys a woman.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
90. “A young lady ought to be two things: tasteful and breathtaking.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
91. “Fashion is architecture: it is a matter of proportions.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
92. “Fashion is always of the time in which you live. It is not something standing alone. But the grand problem, the most important problem, is to rejuvenate women. To make women look young. Then their outlook changes. They feel more joyous.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
93. “Nature gives you the face you have at twenty. Life shapes the face you have at thirty. But at fifty you get the face you deserve.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
94. “No matter the age, a woman who is unloved is lost – unloved she might as well die.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
95. “There is nothing more comfortable than a caterpillar and nothing more made for love than a butterfly. We need dresses that crawl and dresses that fly. Fashion is at once a caterpillar and a butterfly, caterpillar by day, butterfly by night.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
96. “Adornment, what a science! Beauty, what a weapon! Modesty, what elegance!” ~ (Coco Chanel).
97. “Fashion has two purposes: comfort and love. Beauty comes when fashion succeeds.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
98. “Luxury lies not in the richness of things, but in the absence of vulgarity.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
99. “A woman with good shoes is never ugly!” ~ (Coco Chanel).
100. “I don’t understand how a woman can leave the house without fixing herself up a little – if only out of politeness. And then, you never know, maybe that’s the day she has a date with destiny. And it’s best to be as pretty as possible for destiny.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
101. “A well dressed man is a best accessory a woman can have.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
102. “I never wanted to weigh more heavily on a man than a bird.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
103. “A woman is only as good as the peace and light she radiates.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
Short Coco Chanel Quotes
104. “The worse a woman feels, the better should she look.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
105. “Nothing is more beautiful than freedom of the body.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
106. “A beautiful dress may look beautiful on a hanger, but that means nothing. It must be seen on the shoulders, with the movement of the arms, the legs, and the waist.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
107. “Arrogance is in everything I do. It is in my gestures, the harshness of my voice, in the glow of my gaze, in my sinewy, tormented face.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
108. “Fashion comes and goes but style lasts forever.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
109. “One should not seek happiness, but rather happy people.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
110. “I’m so sick of immaturity, of name-calling, of labels, of gossip, of high school. It doesn’t make sense anymore, and I find myself being nice to people that I want to strangle.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
111. “If a woman is poorly dressed, you notice her dress. If a woman is impeccably dressed, you notice the woman.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
112. “True elegance consists not in having a closet bursting with clothes, but rather in having a few well-chosen numbers in which one feels totally at ease.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
113. “Fashion is not something that exists in dresses only.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
114. “There have been several Duchesses of Westminster but there is only one Chanel!” ~ (Coco Chanel).
115. “Elegance does not consist in putting on a new dress.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
116. “It is the unseen, unforgettable, ultimate accessory of fashion that heralds your arrival and prolongs your departure.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
117. “A woman does not become interesting until she is over 40.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
118. “Innovation! One cannot be forever innovating. I want to create classics.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
119. “It is always better to be slightly underdressed.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
120. “Luxury is a necessity that begins where necessity ends.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
121. “True generosity means accepting ingratitude.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
122. “Be classy. Anything but trashy.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
123. “Costume jewelry is not made to give women an aura of wealth, but to make them beautiful.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
124. “Elegance means being beautiful both on the inside and out.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
125. “When putting on accessories, take off the last thing you’ve put on.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
126. “The poetry of fashion lies in the creation of illusion.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
127. “If you’re sad, add more lipstick and attack.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
128. “Look for the woman in the dress. If there is no woman, there is no dress.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
129. “I’ve never done anything by halves.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
130. “Coquetry, it’s a triumph of the spirit over the senses.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
131. “That’s what fame is: solitude.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
132. “Nothing is ugly as long as it is alive.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
133. “Great love too must be endured.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
134. “Traveling is so complicated. There are so many people everywhere. I make my best journeys on my couch.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
135. “Gentleness doesn’t get work done unless you happen to be a hen laying eggs.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
136. “Chanel is above all a style. Fashion passes, style remains.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
137. “The problem of aging is the problem of living. There is no simple solution.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
138. “Yves Saint Laurent is a young man of excellent taste; the more he copies me the more taste he displays.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
139. “Material things aside, we need not advice but approval.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
140. “Passion goes, Boredom remains.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
141. “Those who create are rare; those who cannot are numerous. Therefore, the latter are stronger.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
142. “He who does not enjoy his own company is usually right.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
143. “Before me no one would have dared dress in black.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
144. “Fashion is in the sky, in the street.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
145. “Fashion is made to become unfashionable.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
146. “Women need to be beautiful to be loved by men, and stupid enough to love them.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
147. “I imposed black; it still going strong today, for black wipes out everything else around.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
148. “Women have always been the strong ones of the world. The men are always seeking from women a little pillow to put their heads down on. They are always longing for the mother who held them as infants.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
149. “My friends, there are no friends.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
150. “Since everything is in our heads, we had better not lose them.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
151. “Good taste ruins certain true spiritual values: such as taste itself.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
152. “Women think of all colors except the absence of color. I have said that black has it all. White too. Their beauty is absolute. It is the perfect harmony.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
153. “As soon as you set foot on a yacht you belong to some man, not to yourself, and you die of boredom.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
154. “I am not young but I feel young. The day I feel old, I will go to bed and stay there. J’aime la vie! I feel that to live is a wonderful thing.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
155. “An interior is the natural projection of the soul.” ~ (Coco Chanel).
