Coco Chanel

Gabrielle Bonheur Chanel founded her namesake brand and spent the post-World War I years rewriting feminine style as sporty and casual, a break sharp enough to land her on Time's list of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century. She extended past couture into jewelry, handbags, and fragrance - Chanel No. 5 became iconic, and the interlocked-CC monogram she designed has been in use since the 1920s. Her couture house closed in 1939 when war broke out; she stayed in France during the Nazi occupation and collaborated directly with the Sicherheitsdienst, even carrying an SS peace overture to Churchill in late 1943 through a liaison with German diplomat and spy Baron Hans Günther von Dincklage. After the war she was interrogated but not charged, protected by Churchill's intervention, and moved to Switzerland before returning to Paris in 1954 to revive the house.