Coi Leray drops $5K on Chanel as she revels in this luxury LA retail store

Coi Leray drops $5K on Chanel as she revels in this luxury LA retail store

The Daily Beast

YouTube/Love Has WonDENVER—Several members of a bizarre spiritual group called “Love Has Won” have been taken into custody after the badly decaying body of the group’s leader was found in its headquarters.Amy Carlson, 45, whose followers call her “Mother God,” was found dead in a mobile home in Casada Park, west of Crestone. Saguache County Sheriff’s deputies and Colorado Bureau of Investigation detectives found the self-proclaimed “divine being” of the group after a tip-off from a member who told them her body had been transported to Colorado from across the country.The death and its connection to Love Has Won—which law enforcement and ex-members have previously called a “cult”—were first reported by Be Scofield. While being interviewed by law enforcement, the group would not use the word “deceased,” when referring to Carlson’s death, according to a source familiar with the case. They claimed Carlson was not dead, but was merely “out of communication.”But Carlson’s sister, Chelsea Ann Reninger, confirmed the death, posting on her Facebook: “For those of you that knew my sister Amy, I wanted to let you know we found out yesterday of her passing! Please pray for us and the people involved in this awful situation. We are choosing to remember who she was when she was in our lives on a regular basis and not who she became from this manipulating cult!”Saguache County Sheriff’s Office Sergeant Royce Brubacher told The Daily Beast on Friday that deputies found a body on Thursday inside the mobile home, which serves as the group’s HQ. A law-enforcement source familiar with the case added that Carlson has been dead for weeks, and may have been transported from Oregon. That source said the body was in such a state that investigators couldn’t formally identify her through fingerprints, but witnesses had confirmed that the body is indeed Carlson’s.Love Has Won does a daily livestream on their Facebook page called “Daily Energy Event Update,” but did not mention Carlson’s death on Friday. When The Daily Beast messaged the group on Facebook on Friday, someone replied asking “what are your intentions love” before declining to comment on the group’s leader. In a livestream uploaded a week ago, group members mysteriously claimed Carlson was “in stasis” and was refusing medical care. An image of Carlson from a 2016 video. YouTube/Love Has Won In a VICE documentary released in March, Carlson claimed she had been trying to save humanity for 19 billion years and said she believed that everything society teaches is a lie.“She thinks she is the Earth in a human body. She thinks she’s the Mother of all Creation,” Andrew Profaci, a former member who left the group five years ago, told The Daily Beast on Friday.Profaci said he was in a car accident in 2002 that killed his best friend and was in need of a spiritual reset when he joined the group in 2015. He became the “Father God” to Carlson, he says, “as the other half of the Mother God. The two beings who created the universe.” Essentially, Profaci was her caretaker.“I doted on her and tended to her every need. She drank ten shots of vodka a night. When she would drink at night she would lose her cognitive abilities. She would fall and walk into walls,” Profaci said.Saguache County Coroner Tom Perrin told The Daily Beast there was nothing to indicate her death was caused by foul play, describing the body as extremely thin. “It’s possible that this woman was taking colloidal silver,” he said. (The group has previously hawked colloidials for treating compulsive behaviors.)He added that it will likely be weeks before an autopsy, including the toxicology report, can be completed. Carlson appeared to be losing weight, as shown in this background photo from a recent livestream. YouTube/Love Has Won The senior law-enforcement source who spoke to The Daily Beast said that, when they arrived at the home, there were two children, aged 13 and 2, inside. The 13-year-old has since been taken into family services for care.Seven members of the group were brought into the Rio Grande County jail at 1:30 a.m. Thursday in connection with the death and are being held in separate cells, Rio Grande Sheriff Sgt Jared Quintanos said.Ryan Kramer, John Robertson, Jason Castillo and Obdulia Franco Gonzalez were being held on a $50,000 bond each with two counts of child abuse, and one count of tampering with deceased human remains.Christopher Royer and Sarah Rudolph were being held for two counts of child abuse and abuse of a corpse on a $2,000 bond. Karin Raymond was being held on two counts child abuse, abuse of a corpse, and false imprisonment on a bond of $5,000.Initial appearances for all seven will be held in Saguache County court on May 6.Profaci told The Daily Beast he kept up with the group from afar and had seen Carlson’s health deteriorate.“I saw her death coming based on what was happening over the last months,” he said. “I’ve seen pictures of her. Her health has deteriorated greatly. Her legs were like toothpicks. When I was there she was fine.”He said he believed Carlson never “purposely” took advantage of people but was in “complete delusion.” While he estimates the group had thousands of followers worldwide while he was a member, the compound in Colorado was “just a house full of freeloaders who were smoking a lot of pot.”“Since I left, it’s gotten much darker,” he said. “From what I heard from another member is that they moved her body to Colorado for a worship or something.”Carlson’s family members said in the VICE documentary that Carlson worked at McDonalds until she adopted New Age beliefs in her 30s.On the group’s website, she claimed to be in her “534th reincarnation in my quest to recover my beloved Planet, the Center of the Universe, and the first Planet I created.”Supporters believe Carlson is a divine being who can cure illnesses and will one day lead them into a new mystical fifth dimension—if they offer financial support to the group.But former members described the group to VICE as a “cult,” and said Carlson was a heavy drinker who behaved erratically.“It’s a lot, a lot, a lot, a lot of mental manipulation, a lot of brainwash,” a former member, Taylor, told VICE. “She only lets us sleep four hours. We have to wake up every day at 5:00 a.m. Everything… revolved around Amy.”Profaci said the group believed it was spreading awareness of spiritual awakening, and helping people “to awaken and deal with their inner BS.”The group was forced out of Hawaii last year when they tried to relocate to a home in Kauai. Neighbors objected to their stay and protests outside the home grew so heated that police had to facilitate the group’s safe exit, according to the Maui Police Department.“During their stay on Kauai, several protests, vandalism and small fires had been reported,” Maui police said in a news release. “On Friday, Sept. 4, the protests escalated and the group ultimately decided to leave Kauai for their safety.” Carlson and 13 others flew back to Colorado, police said at the time.Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

Putting on the spritz: Chanel No 5 at 100

Few fragrances – or objects, for that matter – carry as much symbolism as Chanel No 5. What started as the distillation of Gabrielle Chanel’s spirit has evolved into a cultural icon: it was the scent of Marilyn Monroe, evocative of power and seduction; its instantly recognisable glass bottle was immortalised by Andy Warhol; and it remains a bestseller for the house, despite the ever-changing notes of the fragrance world.

This year marks the 100th anniversary of No 5, and to celebrate this milestone the maison is uniting two of Chanel’s passions with a high-jewellery collection inspired by the fragrance. It is audacious, in true Chanel spirit, yet there’s an interesting synergy between jewels and perfume – both are intimate and intensely personal, both are worn on the skin and often take on the individual scent or patina of the wearer, and both assume a role that is a mix of personal pleasure and attraction.

Patrice Leguéreau, director of the Chanel Fine Jewellery Creation Studio, has dreamt of creating a collection around No 5 since he joined the company in 2009. “I knew that 2021 was an important year, a chance to celebrate the perfume, and so it was a natural move for me to develop the concept of this collection. With each new high-jewellery collection I want to open up the Chanel universe, and the story of No 5 is so rich, so mysterious and fascinating.”

Valerie wears Chanel High Jewellery white-gold, yellow-gold and diamond Grasse Jasmine asymmetrical earrings, POA, part of the No 5 collection. Wolford cotton Colorado body, £166 © Ezra Petronio

Akon wears Chanel High Jewellery yellow-gold, platinum, diamond, yellow sapphire and spessartite garnet Golden Sillage earrings, and yellow-gold, diamond and yellow beryl No 5 Drop necklace, both POA, part of the No 5 collection. Chanel leather trench coat, £10,925 © Ezra Petronio

The exact beginnings of No 5 are shrouded in mystery. According to Lisa Chaney’s biography, Coco Chanel: An Intimate Life, Chanel had collaborated with her close friend Misia Sert to create a bottle for an essence that was part cosmetic, part fragrance, and based on a formula apparently made for Catherine de’ Medici, queen consort of France from 1547-59. This foray into fragrance may well have given impetus to Chanel’s idea of creating a signature scent; at the time, it was unusual for couturiers to create fragrances, which was the province of established perfume houses.

Chanel was likely introduced to Ernest Beaux, the Russia-born French perfumer who created No 5, in 1920. For her first fragrance, Chanel, a recidivist rule-breaker, rejected the conventional “soliflore” perfume, which was derived from a single flower. She told Beaux that she wanted “an artificial fragrance like a dress, something crafted. I am a seamstress. I don’t want rose or lily of the valley, I want a composed fragrance.” She also wanted to capture the multilayered complexity of the modern woman. Beaux came up with bouquets of different floral components, concoctions identified by numbers. He is said to have warned Chanel that his use of rare and precious ingredients, particularly jasmine, would be very costly. Coco responded by telling him to add more of them – she wanted to create the most expensive perfume in the world. She was on a mission to revolutionise fragrance, just as she turned fashion and jewellery rules on their head. She wanted a perfume that would accessorise her clothes and express her vision of contemporary luxury.

A 1923 cartoon depicting Chanel on a No 5 bottle © Chanel Gabrielle Chanel in her suite at the Paris Ritz in a 1937 advertisement © Francois Kollar © Ministère de la culture – Médiathèque du Patrimoine, Dist rmn

An advertisement for No 5 from the 1970s © Courtesy of The Advertising Archives

Among the concoctions, it was number five – composed of 80 ingredients, including vetiver, jasmine, sandalwood and neroli – that stood out. Chanel was madly superstitious: five was her lucky number, an alchemical symbol for the universe and she showed her collections on 5 May (the fifth month), so it was perhaps inevitable that this would be the one. She called it, simply, No 5: the epitome of the low-key elegance she favoured, and also the absolute opposite of conventional fragrances with their exotic names. And, whether it was to do with luck or not, Chanel struck on a winning formula: No 5 is still one of the world’s top-selling perfumes, and it paved the way for the house’s broader fragrance and beauty division, which today accounts for around one third of the house’s $12.27bn annual revenue.

Embarking on his jewellery project, in the summer of 2018, Leguéreau spent time imbibing the story, travelling to Grasse with Olivier Polge, Chanel’s perfumer since 2015, and thinking of ways to translate the fragrance into jewellery. Rather than a literal representation, he wanted to capture its seductive sensuality and the emotions it arouses. He painted free-form images of the bottle, the number five and the golden amber of the perfume, conjuring shapes and forms into floating fluidity. “I really felt free to explore this abstract direction. I didn’t think of jewellery at all at the start, just feelings. The more I entered into the mystery of No 5, the more inspired I became, the more I followed my instinct, interpreting what the fragrance evokes for me. No 5 is such a timeless creation. I wanted to take it into the next century.”

Catherine Deneuve in a 1970s magazine advert for No 5 © Courtesy of The Advertising Archives Chanel’s 2004 campaign for No 5, featuring Nicole Kidman, played on the idea of the fragrance as a jewel © Courtesy of The Advertising Archives

Leguéreau did this with five different “chapters”, each suite of jewels representing a vital element of the No 5 story. The architectural, almost clinical shape of the bottle – which was in stark contrast to the figurative flacons of its day – is a recurring symbol. The stopper, which echoes the octagonal outline of the Place Vendôme, is translated as a graphic motif in diamonds, coloured gemstones and rock crystal. It is also the focal point of the 55.55 necklace, the centrepiece of the collection that is focused on a superlative diamond, D-flawless and type IIa (the purest chemically, so with extraordinary limpidity), weighing precisely 55.55 carats. It is not for sale and will remain in Chanel’s archive.

Chanel No 5 High Jewellery white-gold and diamond 55.55 necklace (not for sale)

The number five also becomes a voluptuous, curvaceous feature. The Eternal No 5 choker is composed of a string of diamonds that trail the neck and find the number, which also detaches as a brooch, set jauntily off-centre.

Then there are the flowers, the precious ingredients of the secret formula: jasmine, May rose and ylang ylang. Here, Leguéreau has found the perfect link to the cosmic themes of Chanel’s 1932 diamond collection, which was created against the grain of fashion and during the Great Depression, and represented an about-turn on her own revolutionary advocacy of faux or costume jewellery. The jasmine is likened to a five-pointed star, the May rose corresponds to the moon, and ylang ylang to the sun – a fragrant constellation.

Klara wears Chanel High Jewellery yellow-gold, platinum, diamond, spessartite garnet and yellow sapphire Golden Sillage necklace, POA, part of the No 5 collection. Chanel leather skirt (worn as top), £5,070 © Ezra Petronio

Kim wears Chanel High Jewellery white-gold, diamond, rock crystal and onyx Ribbon Stopper earrings, necklace and ring, all POA, part of the No 5 collection. Chanel viscose dress, £2,195 © Ezra Petronio

Finally, the most abstract and stylised group evokes the “sillage” – the floating waft of fragrance a woman leaves in her wake – starring the dramatic Diamond Sillage, which resembles a constellation of stars.

“The colour aspect was very important,” explains Leguéreau. White diamonds pay homage to the 1932 collection, while a palette of golden-toned gems – yellow sapphires, yellow diamonds, gems with nuances of orange – represent the amber perfume. The Golden Burst necklace, with its baroque feel, captures the hue with a near-incandescent array of 350 carats of imperial topaz. Meanwhile, red spinels and rubies nod to another recurring Chanel motif – there was a special Red Edition of No 5, not to mention the house’s famous make-up packaging.

Perhaps most of all Leguéreau wanted to convey the freedom that was so precious to Chanel, which she counted as the ultimate luxury and mark of modernity. And, explains Leguéreau, the essential classicism of the collection is a tribute to this most classic of fragrances, and the fact the maison today still upholds Gabrielle’s values and embodies her spirit. “In Gabrielle Chanel, a true visionary, we have the chance to interpret what she imagined. She knew her style was the future. We continue what she started.”

Top image: Jade wears Chanel High Jewellery gold, diamond and beryl No 5 Drop earrings and white- and yellow-gold and diamond Grasse Jasmine necklace, all POA, from the No 5 collection. Chanel tweed vest, £4,300.

Models, Valerie Scherzinger at Women Paris, Kim Schell at Viva London, Akon Changkou at Women 360 Management Paris, Klara Kristin at Elite Paris. Casting, Julia Lange. Hair, David Delicourt at Calliste Agency. Make-up, Tom Pecheux at Safe Management using Yves Saint Laurent Beauté. Manicure, Charlene Coquard. Photographer’s assistants, Mathieu Boutang and Nicolas Despis. Digital operator, Yann Gauthier. Stylist’s assistant, Yann Steiner. Special thanks to Lana Petrusevych

Chanel West Coast Reaches ‘New Level’ In Bedtime Pillow Rant

The “America’s Sweetheart” rapper, whose 2020-released album has proven immensely popular, continued: “And I think that’s gonna make me thrive because caring too much can really drive you crazy.”

Chanel added that she was “done with the overthinking” and likewise the “stressing.” Her view was that she’ll stick to “do me and keep the positive sh-t” because that’s “what life’s about. Keeping the positive energy and spreading the good vibes,” she concluded. Those good vibes have been making headlines via all that Miami Beach partying. More photos below.