My Friend, Karl Lagerfeld

ELLE’s creative director, Stephen Gan, looks back on his two-decade friendship with the late legend.

I first met Karl in the late ’90s. It was a warm July night in Paris during Couture Week, one of those romantic evenings where you look back and think, That was so memorable and magical. It was Paris at the height of Paris couture. He wanted to invite some “cool younger people” to a dinner party at his home, so I was there, I guess representing in his mind a new up-and-comer. By pure coincidence, I had borrowed an evening suit from a friend, Hedi Slimane. It was a prototype for one of the first suits he made for Yves Saint Laurent— he was just starting out there as a menswear designer. I had tried it on and said to myself, It’s kind of flashy, but then I thought, If you can’t wear an evening suit like this to Karl Lagerfeld’s, where can you wear it? His exact first words to me were “Lilac?” Because the suit was in lilac silk and most of the fashion people there were dressed in black, and I showed up in this bright suit. We laughed, and from that point on, we struck up a friendship. He was always, to me, very funny and very generous. He represented all the extravagance and superficiality in the fashion world—I mean, he was a big symbol of that—but at the same time, he was such a kind, genuine, sincere, and authentic person. He was very real.