Anna Wintour has stepped down as Vogue’s editor-in-chief after leading the publication for 37 years.
The 75-year-old will remain as Condé Nast’s global chief content officer and Vogue’s global editorial director, and will lead the search for her successor.
The Daily Front Row reports that Wintour informed Vogue staff of her decision during an editorial meeting on Wednesday morning.
Wintour is one of the most powerful and influential figures in contemporary fashion, and her leadership helped Vogue cement its position as a “fashion bible.”
Born in London in 1949, she got her first taste of the fashion industry at 15 when she started working at the influential 1960s boutique Biba, and her first journalistic experience at the underground magazine Oz. She moved to New York in the early 1970s and worked for Harper’s Bazaar and New York magazine as a fashion editor.
Her first job at Vogue came in 1983 when she was poached to become the American magazine’s first creative director. In 1985, she replaced Beatrix Miller as editor-in-chief of British Vogue, but returned to New York City in 1987 to take over House & Garden before arriving the following year as editor-in-chief of Vogue.
Her early years at the magazine were marked by change and upheaval. She recruited her own staff and her first cover for the magazine, which appeared in November 1988, marked the first time a cover model had worn jeans. She said later that the publication’s printers had called because they thought they’d been sent the wrong image.
“It was so unlike the studied and elegant close-ups that were typical of Vogue’s covers back then, with tons of makeup and major jewelry. This one broke all the rules,” Wintour told Vogue in 2012.
“Afterwards, in the way that these things can happen, people applied all sorts of interpretations: It was about mixing high and low, Michaela was pregnant, it was a religious statement. But none of these things was true. I had just looked at that picture and sensed the winds of change. And you can’t ask for more from a cover image than that.”
Wintour’s reign as editor-in-chief saw Vogue reestablish itself as the leading voice in fashion in the 1990s, holding off competition from the likes of Elle, Harper’s Bazaar and Mirabella. Wintour developed a reputation for a hands-on and painstaking approach to Vogue photoshoots, giving her personal approval to all outfits and set-ups. Since 1995, she has also presided over the exclusive guest list for the annual Met Gala.
The best-selling 2003 novel The Devil Wears Prada was written by former Vogue writer Lauren Weisberger, whose time as an assistant to Wintour is believed to have inspired the story and the character of domineering editor Miranda Priestly (played by Meryl Streep in the 2006 film adaptation).
In 2008, Wintour was awarded an OBE. In 2013, she stepped up to become the artistic director of Condé Nast, and in 2019, earned her third job title when she was named the magazine company’s global content advisor.
The news of Wintour’s departure from her primary role comes a few months after she played down retirement rumors during a ceremony at Buckingham Palace, where she was made a companion of honor.
“This morning, His Majesty asked me if this meant I was going to stop working, and I said firmly, no. It makes me even more convinced that I have so much more to achieve,” she said at the time.
