Lagerfeld’s major talent – and one that Chanel’s next creative director will have to possess, too – was perhaps that despite having an encyclopaedic knowledge of fashion history, he was obsessed with newness. “He was completely focused on today,” says Middleton. “It’s why he hated retrospectives of his own work. He thought there was something funereal about that. He was always aware of what was going on in the world and wanted to make something unique and modern.”
One of the most famous examples of this modernity is, of course, his championing of the high-low designer-high-street collaboration, of which he was a pioneer with H&M in 2004. Despite working for the most famous – and expensive – fashion houses in the world, he wanted to democratise fashion and make it for everyone.
This extended to his interest in sales, always keen to know how his work was being received, rather than sitting in an ivory tower. “It was important for him to know that his collections were reaching people. He really had respect for the customer,” continues Middleton. “He was very clear that fashion was applied art, it was something that was made to be sold. He was really pragmatic.”
His longevity, too, is of course important when considering how influential he has been, but he wasn’t a one-trick pony by any means. “He worked for so long, for 65 years and for so many different houses, but there’s no singular Karl Lagerfeld style,” concludes Middleton. “There are some designers that have one design or one contribution, but that wasn’t Lagerfeld’s thing.”
This is how Lagerfeld’s legacy still influences our wardrobes today:
The two-tone ballet flat
Coco Chanel invented the two-tone slingback in 1957 (reportedly to help create the illusion of smaller feet), but it was Lagerfeld who was to reimagine one of the fashion house’s signature designs as a ballet flat. Launched as part of the spring/summer 1984 collection, it was his way of paying homage to one of Chanel’s passions – the Ballets Russes. Since then, it’s a style that’s been adopted by the high street, with dupes at Marks & Spencer, New Look and Next, to name but a few.