Anna Wintour has been the editor-in-chief of Vogue since 1988, and one of the most powerful figures in media. “I don’t know what it is about Anna exactly,” said Laurie Schechter, an early assistant, “but if she could bottle it she’d make a million billion dollars because it just was like fairytale stuff.”
Across more than three decades of Vogue and its spin-offs, she has defined fashion trends and beauty standards, telling millions of people what to buy, how to look and who to care about. She decides which celebrities and models to photograph and which clothes to dress them in. If she wants a designer to have more influence, she recommends them to bigger labels, and she has this power because the owners of those larger labels seek – and follow – her advice.
Editors of Vogue were powerful before Anna Wintour had the job, but she expanded that power remarkably, making the magazine, and herself, a brand that powerful people want to be associated with. “The amazing thing about Anna is the average person knows who she is,” said designer Tom Ford. “You show them a picture and they say, ‘That’s Anna Wintour from Vogue’.” Particularly thanks to the novel and film The Devil Wears Prada, how Anna speaks, hires and fires, eats, and shops are topics of obsession and scrutiny.
She is perceived as “cold” and “icy”, endowed with the rare ability to turn attachments – to both outcomes and people – on and off like a switch. When she walks the halls at , terrified staff press themselves against the wall to stay out of her way. Yet they are devoted to her – indeed, many former staffers feel the need to protect Anna because working for her was as extraordinary as it was gruelling. For many, Anna has been a source of admiration and envy. (As one
