There Was No One Like Karl Lagerfeld
Chanel’s creative director, who died at 85, winkingly played into the stereotypes of a great couturier. But he also refused to be pigeonholed.
In an industry that rarely rewards longevity, it seemed like Karl Lagerfeld would live forever. Thus it’s with a sense of bewilderment that the fashion world mourns the death of Chanel’s creative director on Tuesday, at the age of 85 (ish). Like his famed predecessor, Coco Chanel, Lagerfeld habitually lied about his age, and he seemed to stop time by adopting a personal uniform that was instantly recognizable and endlessly parodied—by , by Neil Patrick Harris as Gunther in Netflix’s , and, frequently, by Lagerfeld himself, who created Fendi in his likeness, employed a phalanx of Karl look-alikes as waiters at the launch of his , and voiced the male model turned villain Fabu in the
