In the 1920s Coco Chanel ushered in the era of the deep dark tan. With her blessing, the tan became a symbol of languorous luxury, rather than a sign of peasant toil under the Tuscan sun. Isolated and rocky beaches along the French and Italian coasts became magnets for the sun-seeking glitterati and their requisite yachts and cocktails. While the farmers whose ancestors hailed back to the Saracens and Romans worked the hillsides with their primitive hoes, the modern Riviera was born.
