The V&A’s very enjoyable exhibition Gabrielle Chanel: Fashion Manifesto kicks off with a photograph of the designer outside one of her first boutiques. At 29, she does not yet look like Coco, queen of chic: her long skirt is somewhat stodgy, her belted sweater a little lumpy. There is no glitter-flecked tweed, nor ropes of pearls. But the jut of her chin as she squints into the sunshine in Deauville, northern France, under the awning printed with her name, the hands clenched into boxer’s fists and thrust into her pockets, makes her instantly recognisable as a force of nature. This...