Coco Chanel Got Chanel Perfume from The Nazis

Coco Chanel

Coco Chanel, also known as Gabrielle Chanel, was born in a poor hospital in 1883 and died in 1971. Father vendor who sold work clothes and underwear while travelling to markets in various towns. When 11 mothers died, 32 fathers sent sons to work as farm labourers and daughters to an orphanage, a religious institution for orphaned girls. It was a frugal life, demanding strict discipline. At age eighteen, Gabrielle went to a boarding house for Catholic girls. Where they learned to sew and found work as seamstresses. Chanel purchased a building in Paris’ fashionable districts in 1918, converted it into a fashion boutique in 1921, and owned five more by 1927.

During World War II, the Nazis gave Coco Chanel the opportunity to profit from Parfums by Chanel, which was partially owned by Jewish Wertheimers, by petitioning German officials to legalize her claim to full ownership.