VOGUE: THE AMERICAN FASHION & LIFESTYLE MAGAZINE

Vogue & The Grandma

The Grandma feels better today. She has decided to go out and walk a little. She has gone to her favourite newsagent's to buy her Vogue magazine and follow the last trends in fashion and lifesytle around the world.

Vogue was born on a day like today in 1892 and it has become in one of the most popular and prestigious magazines around the world.

Before going out, The Grandma has studied a new lesson of her Elementary Language Practice manual (Grammar 45).

More information: Countable & Uncountable Nouns 2

Vogue is a fashion and lifestyle magazine covering many topics including fashion, beauty, culture, living, and runway. Vogue began as a weekly newspaper in 1892 in the United States, before becoming a monthly publication years later.

The British Vogue was the first international edition launched in 1916, while the Italian version has been called the top fashion magazine in the world. As of today, there are 23 international editions.

Vogue & Coco Chanel

In 1892, Arthur Baldwin Turnure, an American business man, founded Vogue as a weekly newspaper in the United States, sponsored by Kristoffer Wright; the first issue was published on December 17 of that year, with a cover price of 10 cents, equivalent to $2.73 in 2017.

Turnure's intention was to create a publication that celebrated the ceremonial side of life; one that attracts the sage as well as debutante, men of affairs as well as the belle. From its inception, the magazine targeted the new New York upper class.

Vogue glamorously recount[ed] their habits, their leisure activities, their social gatherings, the places they frequented, and the clothing they wore...and everyone who wanted to look like them and enter their exclusive circle. The magazine at this time was primarily concerned with fashion, with coverage of sports and social affairs included for its male readership. Despite the magazine's content, it grew very slowly during this period. 

Condé Montrose Nast purchased Vogue in 1905 one year before Turnure's death and gradually grew the publication. He changed it to a unisex magazine and started Vogue overseas in the 1910s. Under Nast, the magazine soon shifted its focus to women, and in turn the price was soon raised. The magazine's number of publications and profit increased dramatically under Nast's management. By 1911, the Vogue brand had garnered a reputation that it continues to maintain, targeting an elite audience and expanding into the coverage of weddings.

More information: Vogue (UK)

According to Condé Naste Russia, after the First World War made deliveries in the Old World impossible, printing began in England. The decision to print in England proved to be successful causing Nast to release the first issue of French Vogue in 1920. 

The magazine's number of subscriptions surged during the Great Depression, and again during World War II. During this time, noted critic and former Vanity Fair editor Frank Crowninshield served as its editor, having been moved over from Vanity Fair by publisher Condé Nast.

Vogue & Coco Chanel

In July 1932, American Vogue placed its first color photograph on the cover of the magazine. The photograph was taken by photographer Edward Steichen and portrays a woman swimmer holding a beach ball in the air.

Laird Borrelli notes that Vogue led the decline of fashion illustration in the late 1930s, when they began to replace their celebrated illustrated covers, by artists such as Dagmar Freuchen, with photographic images.

Nast was responsible for introducing color printing and the two-page spread. He greatly impacted the magazine and turned it into a successful business and the women's magazine we recognize today and greatly increased the sales volumes until his death in 1942.

In the 1960s, with Diana Vreeland as editor-in-chief and personality, the magazine began to appeal to the youth of the sexual revolution by focusing more on contemporary fashion and editorial features that openly discussed sexuality. Toward this end, Vogue extended coverage to include East Village boutiques such as Limbo on St. Mark's Place, as well as including features of downtown personalities such as Andy Warhol's Superstar Jane Holzer's favorite haunts.

Vogue also continued making household names out of models, a practice that continued with Suzy Parker, Twiggy, Jean Shrimpton, Lauren Hutton, Veruschka, Marisa Berenson, Penelope Tree, and others.

More information: Vogue (World)

In 1973, Vogue became a monthly publication. Under editor-in-chief Grace Mirabella, the magazine underwent extensive editorial and stylistic changes to respond to changes in the lifestyles of its target audience. Mirabella states that she was chosen to change Vogue because women weren't interested in reading about or buying clothes that served no purpose in their changing lives.  She was selected to make the magazine appeal to the free, working, liberated woman of the seventies. She changed the magazine by adding text with interviews, arts coverage, and serious health pieces. When that type of stylistic change fell out of favor in the 1980s, Mirabella was brutally fired. Her take on it: For a magazine devoted to style, this was not a very stylish way of telling me."

Vogue & Adele

In July 1988, after Vogue had begun to lose ground to three-year-old upstart Elle, Anna Wintour was named editor-in-chief. Noted for her trademark bob cut and sunglasses, Wintour sought to revitalize the brand by making it younger and more approachable; she directed the focus towards new and accessible concepts of fashion for a wider audience.

Wintour's influence allowed the magazine to maintain its high circulation, while staff discovered new trends that a broader audience could conceivably afford. For example, the inaugural cover of the magazine under Wintour's editorship featured a three-quarter-length photograph of Michaela Bercu, an Israeli model, wearing a bejeweled Christian Lacroix jacket and a pair of jeans, a departure from her predecessors' tendency to portray a woman's face alone; according to The New York Times, this gave greater importance to both her clothing and her body.

As fashion editor Grace Coddington wrote in her memoirs, the cover endorsed a democratic new high/low attitude to dressing, added some youthful but sophisticated raciness, and garnished it with a dash of confident energy and drive that implied getting somewhere fast. It was quintessential Anna. 

Throughout her reign at Vogue, Wintour accomplished her goals to revitalize the magazine and managed to produce some very large editions of the magazine. In fact, the September 2004 edition, clocked in at 832 pages, the most ever for a monthly magazine.  Wintour continues to be American Vogue's editor-in-chief to this day.

The name Vogue means style in French. Vogue was described by book critic Caroline Weber in a December 2006 edition of The New York Times as the world's most influential fashion magazine: The publication claims to reach 11 million readers in the US and 12.5 million internationally. Furthermore, Wintour was described as one of the most powerful figures in fashion.

More information: British Vogue-Instagram

To be in 'Vogue' has to mean something.

It's an endorsement. It's a validation.

Anna Wintour