"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"
About this Quote
The subtext is also a quiet rebuke to old-guard couture, where taste was policed by aristocratic codes and women were literally constrained by clothing. Chanel’s own legacy - liberating silhouettes, borrowing from menswear, privileging movement - makes her argument feel less like theory than like manifesto. Fashion, she implies, is a social technology: it absorbs changes in how people work, flirt, commute, and claim freedom, then turns them into visible signals.
Context matters. Chanel built her empire during a century of upheaval: world wars, women entering public life, mass media accelerating trends, cities becoming stages. Her phrasing tracks that acceleration. By tying fashion to “what is happening,” she frames it as responsive, even restless - not timeless beauty, but time itself, captured in fabric.
There’s a sly democratizing edge here too. If fashion lives “in the street,” then the crowd is co-author. Chanel isn’t just selling clothes; she’s selling a lens for reading modernity - and positioning herself as its sharpest translator.
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| Topic | Art |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
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Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Chanel, Coco. (2026, January 17). 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. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/fashion-is-not-something-that-exists-in-dresses-30633/
Chicago Style
Chanel, Coco. "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." FixQuotes. January 17, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/fashion-is-not-something-that-exists-in-dresses-30633/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"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." FixQuotes, 17 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/fashion-is-not-something-that-exists-in-dresses-30633/. Accessed 18 Feb. 2026.







