In 1926 American Vogue published a drawing of a short, simple black dress by Gabrielle Chanel. It was calf-length and straight, decorated only with a few diagonal lines, and the magazine called it "Chanel's Ford", comparing it with the Model T for its simplicity and reach. Vogue predicted it would become "a sort of uniform for all women of taste".
Until then black was strongly associated with mourning and with the livery of domestic service. Chanel's dress, along with other designs from the house, helped turn it into everyday and evening wear for fashionable women. Chanel herself later said: "I imposed black; it's still going strong today, for black wipes out everything else around."
The little black dress outlived its first version. It stayed popular through the Depression for its economy, was favoured by Hollywood because black filmed well, and was revived in new forms by later designers, most famously Hubert de Givenchy for Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961). A 2014 Chanel retrospective at the Kunstmuseum in The Hague described it as "part of today's universal fashion vocabulary".