"Restrict yourself to giving me your memories. Let me know the real names, and prove to me that you have in no way tampered with your heroes." opening leaf

"Chanel lived at the very center of an extraordinary professional success; yet she suffered extreme loneliness, having failed in what meant the most to her — the life of a woman. What she had, however, was more independence, more freedom than most could ever imagine." forward, p. 9

"Fashion does not only exist in dresses; fashion is in the air, it is brought in by the wind, one feels it coming, breathes it in, it is in the sky and on the pavement, it depends on ideas, customs and happenings." forward, p. 11

"Crazy officers . . . with their foulard caps, slender waists. . . Meanwhile the women — with their overload of ornament — looked like haystacks." Introduction, p. 19

"The apprentice of the Rue...