Lancel House was founded in 1876 by a woman named Angel. She had the mind, ingenuity and courage, and soon she opened her store near the new Opera Garnier building, in the busiest quarter of Paris. At first, Angel traded in smoking accessories, but then she focused on jewelry and women's accessories - after all, in those years, style and fashion were rapidly changing. Soon after House Lancel focused on women's accessories and decorative objects, the world's first Angele Lancel handbag was created, named after the mistress of the House, and which was to replace the classic reticule. It was then, in the "roaring twenties", the House began to grow rapidly.
By 1917, the number of Lancel stores had grown to 17, and at first there were decorative dishes in their display cases, then watches, jewelry, phonographs and cameras, and then bags, the brainchild of the era of ocean liners and long trips. In 1927, Lancel created the legendary Bucket Bag, a ladies handbag-bucket that became the symbol of “French Legerete”. In 2006, this bag was solemnly renamed the Premiere Flirt, and is still one of the most popular “canonical” Lancel models.
In 1929, the House occupied four floors at Place de l'Opera. This building remains the bastion of the company to this day. Albert, who took the reins of government from his mother, gradually turned the family business into a large manufacturer of exclusive leather goods, remaining faithful to the Lancel family qualities: courage, imagination and ingenuity. In general, the period between the First and Second World Wars was marked by the rapid creative take-off of the Lancel brand.
The company exceeded all the expectations of its customers eager for novelty - inventions such as an automatic lighter, Lancel Aviona Trunk handbags or Umbrella Bag were a byword in those days. With the advent of a paid vacation system in the world, more and more people could afford to travel. To meet the new needs of customers, Lancel launched the first Kangourou soft bag: made of lightweight nylon and with an external pocket. According to the recollections of the participants of the famous at that time pop quartet Les Freres Jaques, touring artists fought for possession of such a bag.
In the summer of 1929, an event occurs that will go down much later in the history of Lancel House. The brilliant surrealist and inventor Salvador Dali meets his Muse, the main source of inspiration - the wife of Gala. His love was crazy, frantic, immeasurable. He creates for Gal a special language that belongs only to both of them, the alphabet of lovers - "daligrams".
Almost forty years later, in the 1970s, Lancel Fashion House created a bag for the unique “Dali” collection dedicated to the Gala based on the Daligrams. The handle of this bag has an original design - it is made of a bicycle chain, symbolizing the close connection between two energy flows moving in the same direction.
In 1987, Lancel launched the Elsa Handbag, a reincarnation of the Bucket. She immediately becomes a bestseller and wins the hearts of several million women around the world. In 2006, Lancel House celebrated its 130th anniversary and again focused on leather products. The fair-haired muse of French cinema Alice Taglioni and Olympic champion Laura Manadou became the faces of the brand, the standard-bearers of the new “French lightness” (French Legerete). The legendary Bucket bag was reissued under the name Premier Flirt and turned into a real symbol of the company. In 2008, the face of Lancel was another movie star, Isabelle Adjani, who inspired House to create the magical model The Adjani.
And finally, on the eve of its 135th anniversary, Lancel is once again turning to legends. The presentation of the new collection of Brigitte Bardot handbags was dedicated to this event. Despite the fact that the basis of the Brigitte Bardo handbags was taken on the form of the classic Bucket bag for Lancel House, they still turned out to be not like everything that the company had released before. Softer materials, original embroideries, unique, as if slightly blurry colors - pale orange, cream, cloudy blue, gray, brown or pink, and even the solution of two famous leather tassels on the sides of the bag - everything looks very special. In the style of Bridget Bardot!
An unusual collection of Daligramme bags, dedicated to the love story of Salvador Dali and his muse and wife Gala (born Elena Elena Dyakonova), created by Leonello Borgi, creative director of Lancel House, survived the rebirth. Bags and accessories from the 2011-2012 collection were decorated with “daligrams” consisting of a combination of the initials Dali and Gala (S, D, G), their own language, with the help of which the lovers communicated with each other in letters. Each "daligram", as always, is a declaration of love. Every detail of this collection is symbolic: starting with “daligrams” woven from interweaving of threads of several original colors, in total giving a unique shade, and ending with the lining of the color of red lobster. The collection includes not only bags, but also purses, belts, bracelets and other accessories made of jacquard leather.
And finally, Lancel House celebrated its 135th birthday by inviting world-famous celebrities, VIP guests and fans of the brand to its Champs-Elusees boutique to once again show the world the updated version of its first Angele Lancel bag. You might think that the circle is closed? Not at all. Shortly before the lavish celebration, Lancel House made a loud announcement about itself in the Russian capital, first opening a flagship boutique there and then setting up a unique New Year tree Lancel Daligramme in the lobby of the newly restored Bolshoi Theater. What's next? The answers to this question are yet to come ...
