Glossed Over

Vogue Takes Its Turn in the Lara Stone Sideshow

I haven’t read an issue of Vogue in three months, but good news for me: nothing’s changed! In her January “Letter from the Editor,” Anna Wintour demonstrates the magazine’s remarkably persistent distance from the real world.

[French fashion designer Sophie Theallet] is a very rare creature in fashion these days. As [Lanvin designer Alber] Elbaz told the crowd, it is too often the case these days that people elect to work in style industries in pursuit of fame, not skills. “Why does every girl over five feet tall and age thirteen want to be a model?” he asked. “Why don’t they ever want to be a seamstress?”

Yeah! Why be the beautiful woman who wears the clothes when you could be the poorly paid one who makes them?

Never a magazine to back down from a completely indefensible viewpoint, the issue also includes an article detailing the struggles of size-four model Lara Stone. Which is great, you know, because Vogue clearly offers an unbiased perspective on the fashion industry’s obsession with preternatural thinness. (Sigh.)

From “Hello, Gorgeous”:

It’s hard to say which came first—the superskinny model or the size 0 sample. Either way, the trend has been tough on both the models, who find it nearly impossible to maintain that body type past the age of seventeen, and the magazines that want to show clothes on models who aren’t painfully thin.

Vogue not being one of those magazines, obviously.

Designers who use the superskinny girls defend the trend, saying clothes hang better on a coat hanger. But the opposite is also true—some clothes look better on bodies with “boobs,” which is why Stone’s career has flourished.

What a charming pair of sentences! Slender women's bodies are compared to coat hangers, the fashion industry's ideal woman is actually an inanimate object, and we learn clothes aren't designed for humans. Oh, and for those who don't happen to resemble a hanger, guess what! One model who is still way thinner than most of us is enough to represent us! Who says the fashion industry doesn't love women?

Stone doesn’t blame fashion for her problems. “I like my job,” she says… She doesn’t even blame the designers—“That is their aesthetic. It’s not for me to say whether it’s right or wrong.”

Well, I’ll say it. It is wrong to call a woman fat because she doesn’t resemble a wire hanger. Also wrong? Not blaming designers. Canonizing a coat hanger as the ideal female form isn't the worst thing they could do, but it's probably illegal to make clothes out of asbestos.

By the way, those difficulties writer Rebecca Johnson refers to? They include a recent stint in rehab for alcohol abuse—a habit that began when Stone tried drinking to lose weight. In a sentence so callous that I can't quite believe it's in print, Johnson says this:

Her problems—if you can even call them that—recall the poet Rilke's definition of fame as the collection of misunderstandings that gather around a person.

Got that? Stone's drinking was reminiscent of Rilke, and not, say, indicative of a destructive atmosphere in the fashion world.

“People still tell me I’m fat, but when I look in the mirror, that’s not what I see.”

Maybe Wintour and Elbaz are on to something: why would a woman aspire to be a model when this is how models are treated?

Stone’s recent surge in prominence may well lead to a positive shift in attitudes—but until then, it’s disheartening to see her continually treated like a size-four sideshow.  Her shape makes her an anomaly in the fashion world, but by focusing on her "fat" size-four body, magazines seem to overlook that she's an anomaly in the real world, too.

Related: What W Really Thinks About Women's Bodies

Vogue Liveblog 2009: The Real September Issue

The cover of this year's edition says it's "the REAL September issue," as opposed to The September Issue. It's a differentiation that doesn't make much sense for most of us, since the movie's only opened in one city. But it just wouldn't be Vogue if it were accessible to everyone!

Before I begin the liveblog, the rules: I have not read any part of this issue—in fact, I haven't even opened it. I have not read any commentary from other blogs about this issue. All I've seen are the front and back covers.  And I'll be blogging in real time—just refresh this post to see the latest.

On with the magazine!

Announcing the 2009 September Vogue Liveblog

Vogue, we meet again! Starting at 10:00 a.m. Pacific on Wednesday, Sept. 2, I’ll undertake my third annual liveblog of the September issue of Vogue—reading it all in one sitting and blogging as I go.

Will André Leon Talley imply that he’s a close friend of at least one A-list star? Will Plum Sykes write 47 pages about something totally inconsequential? Will this issue contain a minimum of six hilariously off-base references to the recession? Yes! Will I lose my mind reading all this dreck in one sitting? Almost certainly!

So please join me next week for six hours (or more!) of the biggest fashion magazine of the year. Check out how I did in 2007 and last year—and until next week, no spoilers, please. Unless you want to tell me all about the photos of Hugh Jackman, in which case, you have my full attention.

Vogue's Power Issue Is Less Than Empowering

I have a terrible cold, and it won't go away. Still, there's an upside to being home sick: plenty of time to read magazines! If there’s one person who can shake me from my Nyquil-induced stupor, it’s Anna Wintour. In an attempt to distract myself from the vanishing likelihood of breathing through my nose before Labor Day, I decided to flip through the March issue of Vogue.

Wintour’s monthly “Letter from the Editor” is, predictably, the usual attempt to make the magazine seem relevant by employing the most tenuous of connections to link fashion to a prodigious list of the planet’s ills. For instance: did you know that refraining from buying clothes is indefensible? Your inability to afford designer clothing is why people are losing their jobs! I'm not making this up.

Then, explaining that this is the “Power Issue,” Wintour runs through the list of women who receive considerable space in its pages: Michelle Obama. Carla Bruni Sarkozy. Queen Rania of Jordan. Melinda Gates.

And, not mentioned by Wintour, but appearing in a lengthy profile shortly after her letter, Silda Wall Spitzer.

Notice anything about that list of women? They’re all primarily known for—and because of—the men they married.

In no way do I mean to downplay or diminish the individual accomplishments of these women, all of whom are intelligent and successful in their own right. And I’m not suggesting that there be never be any mention of profile subjects’ personal lives. After all, if that were the case, how would Vogue manage its annual Jennifer Aniston sobfest?

I am suggesting that they include more women whose notability is their own. (To be fair, this issue also contains an article about Twilight author Stephenie Meyer—significantly shorter than the other profiles—and the usual smattering of celebrities and fashion-world types.) When the majority of ink in the "Power Issue" is devoted to women whose renown and influence streams heavily from their spouses, Vogue is either making a cynical observation about the state of women today or telling us that a woman's greatest accomplishment is landing a successful husband.

Not that I expect Vogue to become a serious source of inspiration. But it could be worse—this issue also contains hundreds of words about the apparently transformative powers of Plum Sykes' haircut. I'll take a story about a famous wife over the tale of a woman whose life revolves around her own appearance any day.

Wintour Wednesdays, Thursday Edition: "Fashion, That's All She Thought About"

Welcome to Wintour Wednesdays, our peek inside the unauthorized biography Front Row—Anna Wintour: What Lies Beneath the Chic Exterior of Vogue’s Editor in Chief by Jerry Oppenheimer. Is Wintour’s glacial demeanor affected or genuine? How did she develop her affinity for fashion? And how many decades has she had that haircut, anyway? Let’s find out!

Well, if there’s one lesson to be gleaned from Anna Wintour’s climb to the top of the corporate ladder, it’s that it never pays to stay in a job where you’re not appreciated,

Says former Harpers & Queen fashion editor Min Hogg:

“She had a degree of ambition that must eat away at her heart all the time. Fashion was her absolute world, and she did know more about it than me, so she just didn’t know how to deal with having someone like me over her. Fashion, that’s all she thought about, and she didn’t like anyone who didn’t—in other words, me.”

After a dramatic clash during the shows in Paris, Anna left the magazine—and the country. In New York, she took a junior fashion editor position at Bazaar. Enduring numerous disputes with the editorial director and rumors of her affairs with the photographers she hired for Bazaar’s shoots, Anna was let go after about nine months on staff. This is how she explained it:

“It was for the couture,” she said, “and the editor in chief had a breakdown because I had used models with dreadlocks. You know, it wasn’t a blonde American look!”

Well, she’s certainly mastered the blonde American thing now, hasn’t she?

Next week: Anna does time at Penthouse’s sister publication Viva.

Wintour Wednesdays: "I Didn't Think She Had That Human Element"

Welcome to Wintour Wednesdays, our peek inside the unauthorized biography Front Row—Anna Wintour: What Lies Beneath the Chic Exterior of Vogue’s Editor in Chief by Jerry Oppenheimer. Is Wintour’s glacial demeanor affected or genuine? How did she develop her affinity for fashion? And how many decades has she had that haircut, anyway? Let’s find out!

In January 1970, Wintour became a fashion assistant at Harper’s & Queen, where she quickly demonstrated her innate ability to run a leading magazine.

She had incredible ambition:

“There were other girls who were more talented, who had amazing taste and were chic, but didn’t have that incredible drive that Anna had—like a businessman who is really successful, who only looks in one direction and goes for it. Anna had that—this total conviction that she was aiming for the top job.”

Empathy for those less fortunate than she was:

Because she couldn’t afford private care, [co-worker Jillie] Murphy was treated in one of Britain’s National Health hospitals, the kind of public institution someone of Anna’s social standing would never have seen the inside of. “She was curious, not only to see how I was, but to see what a National Health hospital was like,” says Murphy. “I’ll never forget. She said, ‘It’s like real life.’ I didn’t think she had that human element.”

Formidable skill relating to co-workers:

“Anna couldn’t express her thoughts about fashion,” adds [editor and art director Willie] Landels. “We had a subeditor who said to me, ‘That fucking Anna Wintour! She’s given me this folder and I don’t know what to write because she doesn’t tell me anything.’ And I said, ‘Don’t be unkind about Anna. One day she will be our boss.’”

And a way of inspiring others to be their best:

..,the other girl was “sweet,” but that Anna “absolutely” beat her down and literally drove her out of the magazine. [Literally, eh?—Ed.] Anna didn’t fear competition from her but rather was disgusted by her weakness, which brought out the bully in her.

Next week: Anna climbs the Harper’s & Queen ladder, despite her lack of a first name ending in -ie and her way of being “incredibly spoiled, very flirtatious and slightly naughty, and enormously secretive.”

Wintour Wednesdays: "Don't They Ever Look in the Mirror?"

Welcome to Wintour Wednesdays, our peek inside the unauthorized biography Front Row—Anna Wintour: What Lies Beneath the Chic Exterior of Vogue’s Editor in Chief by Jerry Oppenheimer. Is Wintour’s glacial demeanor affected or genuine? How did she develop her affinity for fashion? And how many decades has she had that haircut, anyway? Let’s find out!

Wintour’s first job in fashion was as a shop girl at the trendy London chain Biba—a gig arranged by her influential father. What better job for someone so intensely aggrieved by crimes against fashion?

“Anna hated badly dressed people,” recalls [her friend Vivienne] Lasky. “We’d sit on Bond Street having tea at some trendy place and she’d comment on all the people. She was very judgmental. Everybody had to be perfect. She criticized their clothes. ‘How can people go out like that? Don’t they ever look in the mirror?’”

Shortly thereafter, on a trip to New York to explore potential fashion industry work, Wintour bunked with her mother’s cousin, who had once been Redbook’s fiction editor. Surely this was a meeting of the magazine minds? Not so much! Her relative recalls:

As it turned out, the magazine editor and the future magazine editor didn’t bond. “We had no connections over the fact of magazines,” she says. “Anna’s interest was solely fashion, and I was totally uninterested in fashion, so we really did not have a lot in common. I was interested in literature, writing, she was interested in clothing. It was fashion that eventually led Anna to magazines, not an interest in magazines.”

Wintour isn’t interested in writing? Well, that certainly explains Plum Sykes’ continued presence in Vogue.

Next week: Anna lands a job at Harper’s Bazaar, where a fellow editor soon discovers Wintour is “sometimes terrifying.” You think?

Wintour Wednesdays: "She Was Fashionably Emaciated"

Welcome to Wintour Wednesdays, our peek inside the unauthorized biography Front Row—Anna Wintour: What Lies Beneath the Chic Exterior of Vogue’s Editor in Chief by Jerry Oppenheimer. Is Wintour’s glacial demeanor affected or genuine? How did she develop her affinity for fashion? And how many decades has she had that haircut, anyway? Let’s find out!

The opening chapters delve into Wintour’s childhood. (I’ll spare you the details about her parents’ college years.) Still, a handful of anecdotes foreshadow the current content of Vogue. Not that her adolescent choices should necessarily be held against her—if that’s how the world worked, I’d be permanently ostracized from polite society on account of a purple satin dress from eleventh grade—but in these instances, plus ça change…

For instance, there is early evidence of her antipathy toward aging:

Anna scoffed at [her teachers], whispered about them, joked that they were so doddering she was absolutely certain their men had been killed in the Boer War. Anna had already developed a thing about age and would later use it as both a creative tool and a weapon when she became a fashion editor.

Delightful! Plus, teenage Anna had already learned to suffer for fashion:

At fourteen, stick-thin Anna watched her diet obsessively, mostly by not eating. Her school lunch usually consisted of a Granny Smith apple. [Her friend Vivienne] Lasky’s mother, a former model, was worried about Anna’s health and thought she was too bony, though Anna felt she was fashionably emaciated… “Anna only ate if it was something special,” says Lasky. “She always has had terrific self-control.” [boldface mine]

Next week: Wintour gets her professional start! Why fashion? “Anna hated badly dressed people.”

Wintour Wednesdays: "She Doesn't Really Like Women"

Welcome to Wintour Wednesdays, our peek inside the unauthorized biography Front Row—Anna Wintour: What Lies Beneath the Chic Exterior of Vogue’s Editor in Chief by Jerry Oppenheimer. Is Wintour’s glacial demeanor affected or genuine? How did she develop her affinity for fashion? And how many decades has she had that haircut, anyway? Let’s find out!

The book’s prologue immediately tackles a burning question: exactly how far removed from reality was The Devil Wears Prada? Turns out, not very much. Author Oppenheimer opens with a glance at a woman on her way to a job interview with Vogue, wearing the Wintour-mandated high heels and bare legs in the dead of winter.

It’s known among the fashion world cognoscenti that Anna is prone to hire based on dress and looks, let alone spike stories if someone is not photogenic enough for her. “If we’re talking about fashion editors, on the whole it’s important to me that they have a sense of style,” she’s intoned. And on the editorial side... “after a few months they will end up looking like Vogue. It just rubs off that way.” As a Vogue editor who knows and abides by Anna’s rules notes, “People who work here have to look a certain way. If somebody hasn’t changed their appearance within six months…something isn’t going right.”

While Wintour appears to be inflexible about her appearance standards, she’s certainly malleable when it comes to intimidation! The interviewing candidate explains:

 “Anna was very, very cool and contradicted everything I said. She would ask me questions and I would answer in the most intelligent way I could, and then she would contradict me. For instance, she said, ‘What would you do in the music section?’ I said something about ‘going very upscale.’ And she said, ‘We’re a populist magazine.’ [Ha!—Ed.] She asked me what I’d do with another section, and I told her I thought that deserved a populist view. She said, ‘We’re an upscale magazine.’ She just didn’t want me to win.”

Of course, our candidate could reassure herself—it wasn’t personal. According to her:

“The thing is, she doesn’t really like women, which is certainly curious for the editor of the world’s most influential fashion magazine for women.”

Curious, sure, but woefully evident in the pages of Vogue.

Next week: Anna’s childhood forays into fashion include modifying her school uniform (ooh, rebellious) and eschewing athletics lest strenuous exercise render her legs misshapen.

Working Girl Wednesdays: A Retrospective

At last, we’ve wrapped up our journey to the world of working women in 1964. Sure, Sex and the Office was rather ridiculous, but it was also delivered a healthy dose of perspective. Aren’t you glad to live in an era where sexual harassment laws exist and women don’t have to justify working outside the home?

Here’s a brief review of the many lessons Helen Gurley Brown imparted. Hey, you never know when you’ll have a chance to time travel!

• How to love a boss—even if that boss is (gasp!) female! (The advice on how to, ahem, love a boss comes later.)

• Why showing generous amounts of cleavage is a savvy negotiation strategy

• The best way to manage a 16-step makeup regimen—for work

• Why “a retarded beginning” is, in fact, a good thing

• Flattery will get you everywhere

• Guaranteed conversational techniques to land a job without ever discussing your career

• Lunch breaks are so complex they require three whole chapters encompassing food, sex, and even more sex

• Drinking alcohol at work is completely justifiable

• Bilking your company when you travel for business is easy!

• Advanced techniques for convincing men to pay your way

• There’s no excuse for rebuffing a co-worker’s advances

• Apparently, the women of the early 1960s enjoyed a beating

• Five words: “Him heap big man inside”

• How to launch a career as a real working girl

• Why women should thank their husbands for letting them hold a job

• How to pick Jewish people out of a crowd

Next week, Working Girl Wednesdays will morph into…Wintour Wednesdays. I’ll be dishing the juicy details of Anna Wintour’s life, courtesy of Jerry Oppenheimer’s biography Front Row—Anna Wintour: What Lies Beneath the Chic Exterior of Vogue’s Editor in Chief.

Not surprisingly, Wintour’s childhood concerns haven’t changed much. For instance, at age ten, Wintour was told she was a gifted runner who could eventually be an Olympic-level competitor. Her response: “How frightful! What on earth will happen to my legs?”

Next week: is it possible Anna Wintour has never eaten a full meal in the presence of another human being?