Coco Chanel
Although Chanel was viewed as a prominent figure of luxury fashion during her life, Chanel's influence has been examined further post death in 1971. She continued to spend her final years in luxury evermore at her magnificent Ritz apartment. When Chanel died, the first lady of France, Mme, Pompidou organized a hero's tribute. Soon damaging documents from French intelligence agencies were released that outlined Chanel's war time involvements that quickly ended her monumental funeral plans.
Coco Chanel
In 1923, Vera Bate Lombardi, (born Sarah Gertrude Arkwright), reputedly the illegitimate daughter of the Marquess of Cambridge, afforded Chanel entry into the highest levels of British aristocracy. It was an elite group of associations revolving around such figures as politician Winston Churchill, aristocrats such as the Duke of Westminster, and royals such as Edward, Prince of Wales. In Monte Carlo in 1923, at age forty, Chanel was introduced by Lombardi to the vastly wealthy Duke of Westminster, Hugh Richard Arthur Grosvenor, known to his intimates as "Bendor". The duke lavished Chanel with extravagant jewels, costly art, and a home in London's prestigious Mayfair district. His affair with Chanel lasted ten years.