Outliers Research Paper
Gabrielle Bonheur Chanel, more widely known as Coco Chanel, is a prominent icon in the high fashion industry. She is known worldwide for dominating not only the garment industry, but also extending to handbags, jewelry, and fragrance. She became the only fashion designer to be put on Time Magazine’s list of 100 most influential people of the 20th century. She achieved both success as a businesswoman and role model in her lifetime. In Gladwell’s book Outliers, he discusses success due to both inherent and external factors. Her road to success parallels with many of Gladwell’s external phenomenons. Coco Chanel made her name in the fashion industry and became a couture icon due to external factors including the 10,000 hour rule, demographic luck, and exposure to meaningful work.
Coco was born into a poor family in 1833 in a small town in France. Her early life was spent in a convent since her father left them and her mother died. When she was 17, she got her first job as a seamstress with the help of the nuns running the convent. Although she seemed content doing this, she secretly wanted to escape the tedious work and ran off to try to make it as a cabaret singer. This venture did not bring her stardom, but she did meet someone who would help kick start her fashion career. His name was Etienne Balsan; a rich, young playboy who took Chanel in and moved her to Paris as one of his back-up mistresses. Chanel refused to conform, and instead of the uniform satin dresses she wore plain dark-colored dresses that marked the start of the fashion trend that would make her name known across the globe.
Throughout the 1920s Chanel’s success, both social and professional, continued to grow. She was an icon across Europ...
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...the right people and having these right experiences helped shape her career and form her legendary success.
It seems natural talent is rare these days. Anyone who is good at anything will have a story about how they got there. Usually these stories include key people, places, or strategies that helped them achieve success. For Coco, these external factors worked in her favor. Gladwell’s ideas presented in Outliers are supported in her journey to fame. He stated that “the closer physiologists look at the careers of the gifted, the smaller he role innate talent seems to play and the bigger the role preparation seems to play” (38). In a world where talent arises from external forces, there must always be someone with bigger and better to push others to try to be even better than that. This is the cycle of success that keeps our world growing and improving every day.
Florence was born in January of 1896 in the slums of Washington, DC. As the daughter of ex-slaves, she had it rough, but this girl had an ability that would soon show. She won a talent contest at age four, and by age seven she had made her professional debut. Two years later, she joined a vaudeville touring company. Since she was too young to do this, it was not very long before she was arrested and put into an institution.
Berry, Hannah. “The Fashion Industry: Free to Be an Individual.” The Norton Field Guide to
Her lasting career was not given to her easily, therefore, creating an inspiring story full of hardships and success. Ever since she was a little girl, her dream was to become a successful and famous dancer. In New York City, when she was trying to fulfill her dream, she was unable to find a job in the theatre department. Instead of being discouraged, she decided to make something good come from it. She choreographed her own routines, created her own costumes, and organized solo recitals for audiences to enjoy. This event led her to the biggest adventure in her life that would later impact the world. She was invited to return back to London to pursue her education in the performing arts, so that she could further improve her talents that would make up her entire career.
...s far as the author is concern, the fact that CoCo Chanel left the Victorian ideas and lived a life of her own made other women admire her. According to the author, clothing design was her star that raised her above other women. It would be better if other women would emulate her character and moral beliefs that should attract other women.
Her parents who at that time could not understand the choices she made are very happy for their daughter and what she has accomplish. When she left her home at the middle of a fight and never went back. She said,” I had to make my own way” and then lived in a Manhattan dance studio where she was training. Then she got an apartment with some friends in Manhattan Hell’s Kitchen. Since the time she move out of her home she started her showbiz career as a dancer in stage musicals and most notably in her tour to Golden musicals of Broadway and in a Japanese tour. Then she audition to be a fly girl in Fox’s hit comedy “In living Colors,” she beat out 2,000 other contenders in a nation wide competition. Then she cracked into Hollywood and she wanted to make a transition to acting, but she followed Color producer Keenan Ivory Wayans advice to stay with the show for a while before making any attempt to move on.
Claudette Colvin was born September 5, 1939 in Alabama (Hoose, 1947). Throughout Claudette's lifetime there was a numerous amount of struggles she had to face. Some of the struggles that she has overcome would be discrimination and the death of her oldest son at a fairly young age.
She started with nothing, being the poorest of poor and grew to be a media giant. She overcame poverty, neglect, sexual abuse and racism. Through it all she never gave up and this is why she will inspire others to do the same.
In Outliers Malcolm Gladwell calculates success. Through the repeated praxis of shattering the reader’s idea that masters in a particular field achieve their success through individual talent he unravels how their given circumstances was what truly led them to what they became. Example after example he proves how conditions as simple as the year they were born led to their later achievement; the author even demonstrated how a person’s culture can later affect their job performance. CoCo Chanel, arguably the most famed and inspirational fashion
These attributes gave her the key to working with the most notable producers, script writers and musical producers in the history of Broadway. Her many shows gave her the opportunity to understand herself as a Broadway actress and her voice stands alone to all of the people who followed. Her voice will live on in theaters and she will continue to remain a pinnacle of Broadway history.
To begin, Julia Child was born on August 15, 1912 in Pasadena, California. She lived a very normal life. She was raised in a stable family and was involved in many sports. Being involved in so many sports, she was known as the most athletic girl in her school. Though raised as a normal kid she was different from her peers. She was very tall; at least a head and shoulder taller than all of the other children in her grade. When she went to high school she was sent to a boarding school in Northern California. While attending the boarding school she developed a very strong sense of leadership. Soon after high school she went to Smith College and earned her degree in history. “At Smith I did some theater, a bit of creative writing, and played basketball. But I was a pure romantic, and only operating with half of my burners on; I spent most of my time there just growing up.” (Julia’s Life: Timeline. 1934) Julia never planned on becoming a famous chef. She actually wanted to pursue writing after college. She moved to Manhattan and became a copywriter. Soon after, Julia moved back to take care of her dying mother. She continued writing for local publications.
and supported by her fans. Her talent takes her to many places because she always has a creative
The future of women’s fashion is uncertain—in that shock value is harder to come by with each passing year. There is a concept in fashion that nothing is new, everything has been done before. This theory is coming closer to obvious reality, as fashion shows of recent years have visual throwbacks as late as the Victorian era. Although the direction is not yet decided, it is almost definite that women will use fashion as an important tool for expression and freedom in the future.
Paul Poiret was born on April 20th, 1879 in Paris, France. His contributions to twentieth-century fashion has earned him the title in many people’s eyes as the “King of Fashion”, because he established the principle of modern dress and created the blueprint of the modern fashion industry. Poiret’s designs and ideas led the direction of modern design history. He was born into a working class family and his natural charisma eventually gained him entry into some of the most exclusive ateliers of the Belle Époque. Jacques Doucet, one of the capital’s most prominent couturiers, hired him after seeing promising sketches he had sold to other dressmakers. Furthermore, he was hired by the House of Worth and was put to work to create less glamorous and more practical, simple items because his out of the ordinary designs were not welcomed in open arms by opulent clientele. Despite this experience he was still confident in his ideas and ventured out on his own with money barrowed from his parents and opened a storefront. Moreover, he wanted to promote of the concept of a "total lifestyle” was seen as the first couturier to merge fashion with interior design. His independent work broke the normal conventions of dressmaking, and overturned their underlying presumptions. He liberated the woman’s body from the petticoat and the corset to allow clothing to follow woman’s natural form. Poiret also radically revolutionized dressmaking to switch from the emphasis surrounding the skills of tailoring towards those based on the skills of draping and began to use bright colors. Furthermore, Poiret was apart of the art deco movement, which was surrounded by a period of immense social upheaval, particularly for women, and emergence of technol...
Gabrielle Chanel remains one of the most well-known fashion designers of all time. She was born on August 19, 1883 in France and died in 1971. Chanel revolutionized the fashion industry with her distinctive style. After the death of her mother, she spent much of her childhood in an orphanage. The challenges of her early life helped build her strong character which influenced her path in life. Chanel was nicknamed “Coco” after a lost dog in a popular song she loved to sing. Her early career was funded by a succession of her rich lovers. This allowed her to open her first shop in Paris in 1910. She sold hats as well as some garments. Coco developed a significant following of clientele who enjoyed her practical sportswear creating great success.
Fashion has been around ever since ancient times, since the time of the Romans, it survived the world wars and is yet today a business with rapid changes. Fashion started off as an art form, a way for the rich to show their social status with unique and innovative designs that only they could afford. It was a way to separate the social classes of the society. In this paper I will include the creators of haute couture, and how the following designers developed couture, as well as leading names in today’s ready-to-wear industry. The list is long, but I chose to focus on the three most important designers in the modern fashion industry.