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It’s a known fact that the star of American Vogue fly-on-the-wall doc, The September Issue (see my review of it here), wasn’t Anna Wintour, its fearsome editor. It was Grace Coddington, Vogue’s creative director. She is the soul and the heartbeat of the magazine.
So I was delighted by Vogue’s thoughtful article on one of its own, in the latest issue of British Vogue. Pure bliss for me, reading about inspiring style while getting over a nasty cold, in the Sonoma sunshine!
Grace is an original, and a rare person in the fashion world that hasn’t let changing times, new technology and commercial pressures, muddy her pure point of view. Grace creates the most inspiring fashion tableaux, and will to go any length to get the perfect shot. Driven purely by her artist’s eye, her pictures sell clothes more effectively than any number of Z-list celebs with a massive Twitter following could ever do.
One of my favorite ever shots of her, (sadly i can’t find it online to share with you), was of model Stella Tennant, snapped mid-dive into a swimming pool, wearing a tweed suit and rainboots, yet somehow the epitome of chic. How does Grace do it?? And how much work must have gone into getting that shot?
Here’s to an inspiring original.
So, Friday night found me at the Kabuki movie theater in San Francisco, balcony seat, glass of white wine in one hand, buttered popcorn in the other (surely the greatest gastronomic combination ever?), sinking into a plush seat, after a long week.
I was there to watch The September Issue, the fabulous new documentary about the months leading up to the September issue of American Vogue. In fashion world, that particular month’s issue is like all the Christmases come at once. It has that back to school freshness, that feeling of wanting a whole new stylin’ wardrobe for those rare, but exceptional, perfect Fall days, and has all the high-end advertisers clamoring for space.
The ostensible reason for people to be interested in the film, apart from the fabulous fashions, was to peek at the famed, and feared, editor in chief Anna Wintour. Ms Wintour is a feisty Brit who was rumored to be the inspiration for Meryl Streep’s character in The Devil Wears Prada. Indeed. I caught sight of her once, while having brunch at Balthazar in NYC, and there was quite the aura of fabulousness around her, even at 11:00am on a Sunday!
And it didn’t disappoint on that count. The documentary maker, RJ Cutler, did an excellent job of probing beneath the well manicured veneer, without disturbing even one of the very well groomed hairs on Ms Wintour’s head. Everything was very polished and very presentable. But that spoke volumes. And not always in a positive way. One of her opening quotes, which involved something about ‘women who wear K-Mart blue jeans’ struck a wincing tone with most of us, still mired in recessionary thinking, and wondering if we’ll ever come out of it.
But there was another star of the show. Vogue’s creative director, Grace Coddington, a wild-haired, strong-willed Welsh wonder, who quietly stole every scene she was in, despite a professed reluctance to take part in it at all. Grace is clearly from the old school. The days before celebrities made the cover of every fashion magazine, and before advertisers ruled the runway. In every scene, Grace lets you know, very quietly, but with oh so much passion, that she is in charge of artistic inspiration at Vogue. Anna Wintour is in charge of business, Grace is in charge of making it beautiful, and it works brilliantly together. Even something as superficial as a fashion shoot made me quite teary-eyed when viewed through the still starry-eyed lens of Grace.
And that’s before we even get to the comedy relief provided by Andre Leon Talley. I’m not quite what he does at Vogue, but it’s fabulous. Taking a tennis lesson, while draped in in Louis Vuitton, he just oozes unnecessary glamour, and you gotta love him for it.
I loved this documentary, because I love fashion, and I actually love the entire ridiculousness of it. It’s fantastic, escapist relief when things are a little bleak, and you just need to look at something fabulous. And what can be more fabulous than sitting down with the September issue of Vogue?
