Elegance is refusal.

The earliest solidly documented appearance in the provided material is in Diana Vreeland’s 1980 book “Allure,” where she uses the line while discussing what elegance is (as distinct from simply being well-dressed). In that passage she explicitly says she does not know who originally coined it, even though she claims to have known the saying all her life. Later press coverage (e.g., The New York Times in 1980) repeated the line in connection with Vreeland, and subsequent proximity of Chanel’s name to the quote in later articles appears to have helped spur misattribution to Chanel.

The remark frames elegance as a disciplined selectiveness: elegance comes from what someone chooses not to add, not to display, or not to indulge. The “refusal” is a kind of restraint that keeps style coherent and uncluttered.

“Elegance,” I said, “is refusal.”