Influential fashion journalist André Leon Talley dies at 73

Mhm. Hi everyone. Thank you all so much for joining us today. It is an enormous privilege to welcome Mr Andre Leon Talley for a conversation presented by hearst black culture in partnership with O the Oprah magazine? I'm Tommy J Atkins, the co founder and co chair of Hbc Mr Talley, How are you today? Welcome. Thank you. Can you hear me well, yes, I can eat perfectly. I love the masks. Thank you. Pleasure to be here. Wonderful. Thank you so much. So, before we begin, I'll just give everyone a little bit of background on Andres iconic career. I mean, obviously you are a household name, mr Tallinn, we all know you and love you. Um but for those who are who are just joining us. Mr tally is one of the most influential voices in his in the history of fashion. His legendary career began as a junior editor, Andy Warhol's interview magazine. In 1975. He went on to hold top editorial positions in paris France and in the United States for top publications such as W W. D. W magazine and most notably as the creative director and editor at large of vogue magazine. He also is the author of a superb new memoir called the chiffon trenches, and that is where I would like to begin our discussion today. Um So, mr tally in your book. Um you mentioned that you were born in Washington, D. C. But grew up in during north Carolina raised by your grandmother. The book offers vivid descriptions of your childhood poignant memories about your late grandmother's immaculately pressed linens and the glamour of sunday morning church services. How did your experience growing up in north Carolina shape your perspectives on fashion and style? Well, thank you Tommy for that question. My experiences as a child In my grandmother's home. It's hard to talk to this one totally shaped who I am. I am the person I am today because of my grandmother and her values, her religious values, her simple home. She was a domestic, made for five decades of her life at Duke University in the men's dorm. And uh, we had a very humble, humble home. We were not on welfare stamps. Our center of our lives was the church. We want to go to church every sunday, we go to prayer meeting, we go to revivals, we go to hunt reunions and um my grandmother, I just remember her being just a very solid inspiration and I looked up to her and this is who I am, because my grandmother and I really honor my grandmother when saying this and this shaped me to who I am today and who I am. As I went through this fawn trenches, as I say in my book, I went through decades and decades and I survived because of my faith and my core values and my never forgetting where I came from as a black man, a man of color in this country. This, this country and it's it's extraordinary country of which is a great country, but of course, you know, with all the things that are going on Black Lives Matter. This is a country that we just still not resolved the issues of race after four centuries. Absolutely. Um and in the book you you share that you developed a sort of fantasy world via books and magazines immersing yourself in french culture and consuming an immense amount of french literature in your adolescence. Yes, I did, I did. I escaped into books. Um books can be your best friend's books can Absolutely. I think Groucho Marx said books and dogs can be your best friend with books are certainly of my best friends. That's why I was survived in the in the COVID-19 epoch era by reading books, hopefully every morning I read a book through this summer. Now it's fall, I hope to be able to do that as well. Um I escaped into the world of books, I escaped to the great literature, the french literature, particularly my first important book that I ever read was Gustavo Lopez madame bovary. And that book has stayed with me throughout my 71 years on this earth. And I could say that Madame bovary was sort of a the first consumer junkie or Shopping addicts in the 19th century. She had fantasies about having beautiful clothes and beautiful surroundings. But of course it led to her untimely end drinking arsenic, but it was a great book and I loved that and I love reading vogue, I knew every page of vogue If I ever met anyone at vogue? As a teenager, I read vogue as opposed to aspiring to be in the uh Marching band or two, be on the basketball team. And because of the football games, I aspired to reading vogue, not just for the fashion, for the literary excellence, the exceptionalism, adora wealthy stories on Adora wealthy Truman Capote, um William Faulkner, Chekhov writers, William styron. So that's where I formulated my my my my my universe and did it shape how you dressed as a young person? No, as a young person. I dressed according to what my grandmother told me to wear. My mother and father who supported that. So my mother and father's shop for my clothes mostly in Washington D. C. Where they were both based. They were at a very young age. I was given very beautiful clothes, very very few amount of clothes for the best they could afford. So all my sunday clothes were my sunday best and in the week when I went to elementary school high school I just wore whatever there was to wear. I don't remember wearing blue jeans at all. I remember wearing corduroy pants for school and I remember wearing plaid shirts and I remember having a beautiful mustard corduroy coat, bought the best store in downtown Durham of course paid for by my father would send money to my grandmother to support me weekly? You would actually send cash in an envelope. Can you believe today? Can you imagine sending cash in envelopes per week. He didn't even do money orders cash, cold cash. Now there's Venmo and cash, have you heard of? Exactly. Wonderful. And then in terms of just the church uh they're, they're vivid, very sound imagery or imagery about um church dressing and how sunday service in packaging. Can you expand a bit on that? Well, the culture of the church of the missionary baptist church, The family church was pivotal to my well being because I had some darkness in my childhood but in the church I found the light, the light of my relatives, the light of the beauty of the women the way to address and the men because my uncles were beautifully dressed, handsomely dressed pilots shoes, white shirt starch, starch within an inch of their life, ironed by their wives, beautiful suits and beautiful manners and I looked into my uncle but particularly my uncle George, I had an uncle Lewis who was a barbara and uncle Lewis had a beautiful house. His, his his wife noni, they had these beautiful cities and they gave christmas parties and we all gathered at the christmas parties. They had beautiful crystals and a beautiful dining room table. So all of that it was impacted upon me as I was growing up. I knew that there was beauty and style. It was in the black culture and I didn't talk about it. But it was I was surrounded by it and I was nurtured by it. Wonderful. And the book begins with a story about Beyonce September 2016 cover of Vogue, which also was the first uh cover shot by a black photographer, Tyler Mitchell. Or were you when you first saw the cover, and how did the images resonate with you? I was at home and someone sent it to me online and then the Washington post asked me to write an op ed about it. And I was so proud that the Washington post asked me to write about that I had nothing to do with it. I was no longer in vogue. I was in vogue, sort of randomly. Not frequently. I wrote the op ed and they approved of it and they published it. And I sunday the Washington post came out. I sent the up air to Susan Fleischmann, the publisher of Vogue, who was a friend of mine and she's a very nice lady. And I sent it to her and she was so proud of it. She says I'm gonna send this to all the top editors at vogue. So she said she sent it to all the editors at vogue and she sent it to all the people that voted with my friends. Not one person ever said or complimented me on this and I took the time to pin this and respectfully pendant in honor of vogue honoring mr Mitchell and honoring that historical moment when a black photographer in the century old history of vogue finally got his chance to prove that black excellence and exceptionalism is as brilliant as white counterparts. Absolutely. And it's just a personal anecdote. I literally remember kind of receiving um that that um that that article, remember at vogue at the time, I was I was at vogue at the time and reading it and just seeing your poignant words really filled me. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much appreciate it. Um one of your first gigs was as a volunteer for the Met costume Institute is where you developed a strong relationship with your mentor at the time, Diana Vreeland. Uh your first project was assembling what seemed to be a rather complex chain mail dress worn by Lana Turner in the Prodigal. Like you're really encapsulates how you, how disciplined you are and how at a very early age you were so hungry to just achieve. Um so can you just let us know what that discipline came from and just give us more about what that experience was like for you, discipline is. I did not want to let Diana Vreeland down. Of course not. I don't want to let anyone down. I got my foot in the door. I became one of the chosen. Um um Volunteers. I think the list was about 20 at that time. Maybe now there are more, but I remember Tony Goodman. I met her and robert Turner, a former friend of mine from Rhode island was one of the volunteers on that first show that I worked on romantic and Hollywood glamorous design and I might. But my goal was not to let Diana Vreeland down. I couldn't disappoint her. And so I just used my brains the best I could. And I succeeded in. I think we had a goal. I'm a dress from Claudette Colbert, Cleopatra, black and white by Adrian bias cut as exquisite as equal to address from paris. And that was my assignment to mount that dress and present a proposition to Mrs Vreeland. And so I sat around and thought about it and thought about it. Mrs Vreeland gave us sort of prologue and she said, you know, Cleopatra is a young teenage queen. She's followed by peacocks in her garden all day. And there are a lot of old people in the in Egypt on the rooftops. And she's frustrated. And I painted the gold mannequin goal like I permission from Stella blum, the technical curator to paint the mannequin goal. And then I put the gold dress on the gold mannequin. And Mrs Vreeland walked by and she thought the Red Sea had parted and I had the only discipline I ever thought that I had around Mrs Vreeland or anybody that I respected is this is a key key and core to anyone's success is that I listened and I learned I did not project my opinions and I think when you're young, you have to listen and you learn. That's why you go to class. That's why you're in a classroom, in high school, junior college College, advanced college, you're listening and you're learning and that you can do, deduce what you feel. Um Mrs Vreeland thought that I had such a knowledge of fashion, but my knowledge only came from my reading and do my homework and I always say, do your homework and you can't go wrong. Mm And so I lived on Mrs Vreeland's every word. She did not give you instructions. Like, would you please put the red dress in the red gallery and please mount it. She stands in front of me in her office and she would give a narrative. Each dress has a narrative. It has a story about who made it, who wore it, why how luxurious it is inside and outside. And this is how I learned my craft as a fashion journalist, marvelous. And you spend a significant portion of your career in paris. I'm very lucky to have gone to paris in the days when it mattered. You also say you're 13 pieces of luggage that you know that that that is that is just simply a part of the narrative. That's not important that I arrived with 13 pieces of unmatched luggage. I arrived with the determination to succeed and to not let anyone down who had believed in me first and foremost, my grandmother, my mother, my father, my family and most importantly, my mentor, Diana Vreeland and my boss john Fairchild and Michael Cody, who was my great, great supporters of my challenge. I would not be anywhere in my career, were it not for Diana Vreeland, john Fairchild and Michael Cody. And they launched me. And um it was, it was unique. I don't think you have that kind of attention. You would have to dig with those kinds of people. It was a smaller world then the world of style was a smaller world. Now it is global. You got online everything you're watching the fashion shows in the pandemic 3 60 runway runway 3 60 whatever is called by the C F D A. And I quite frankly have to make a complaint because I couldn't get on last night to see Tom Ford's show at seven o'clock. And I was extremely frustrated because therefore I went to bed without seeing the deliciousness of Tom Ford Spring Summer collection inspired by plat Cleveland, the one of the world's greatest african american models that he worked with it. And I'd worked within. And John assured these were the Great Great Stars of the 70s because of Antonio Lopez. So the world is smaller. So everyone has the access to that information. Now Tom Ford was inspired by Pat Cleveland. It's you can click on it in Dubai or you can click on it in Moscow or paris back in the day, you had to wait to read about this in women's wear daily or vogue or harper's bazaar or fashion magazines. It just didn't come to you overnight, You know what I mean? Mhm. Absolutely. And during the time in in in paris, you witnessed the influx of black models into the Parisian fashion scene as a result of the iconic battle Versailles, which is a fashion show held in november 1973 between french and american designers to raise money for the Palace of Versailles restoration. You also raised about the Givenchy show featuring all black models. Can you share how blackness was perceived in paris and why you feel paris embraced black culture more than the U. S. Did during that time? Well, first of all, let me correct one small, small thing Tommy, I was not present at the battle of, had not arrived on the scene until 1974 in New York. I was in school, University of Brown, but I was well aware of that extraordinary moment in fashion when back lit once world and almost swirled off the stage right to the very end and she swirled like a swirling dervish and stopped right at the edge of that stage, which gave her climatic Sensational moment and the whole theater in verse. I'll just through their programs up in everything. But that was the beginning of the rise of the importance of black models after 1973, they were considered superstars into 1970 for 75. And when I got to Paris in 1978, they were the stars, Even Someone Wrong made a collection inspired by porgy and Bess, the opera by George Gershwin. And that star in that runway collection. My first ever show in paris Friends sitting on the front row is a tall, skinny black man was porgy and Bess and Monje was the star of the show. And I know because I have spent a lot of time with in the previews asking him what his inspiration was and he said I was listening to the opera porgy and Bess in my Volkswagen car going to work and that inspired me And those clothes resonated beautifully. They were 1978 was a pivotal year in a career and in the, what do you call it? Um when you have your career resume or whatever your curriculum vitality or whatever you call it because Mr san Laurent and has been inspired by many things of beauty. But this was inspired by the folk opera. The american folk opera pouring invest and mind you, the people in the folk opera are not aristocrats. They are uncle people in Catfish Row, some on drugs, some are struggling their maids and their their railroad workers and he made this luxurious nous and when I was sitting there, the show unfurled and it reminded me so much of the clothes I reminded of my family wearing, my relatives were wearing those kind of clothes in church. Not those kind of clothes equal to Center Uncle Tour, but the kind of attitude. Excuse me? Excuse me, Please people. The kind of attitude, I'm trying to get this out. The attitude of the clothes. The attitude of the way the hat, the Kano ta and the chiffon stock. So sunday church and the high heel not too high but a saucy hell a jaunty high. And an attitude. The gesture, mm hmm. Fabulous, Fabulous, Fabulous. And so in terms of blackness and being embraced in paris versus the United States, what are the differences that you saw between between both nations? People tend not to think of color in paris. They think of beauty and excellence when they see a model they're not looking for. Well, I have to have a black model, you might say at one point people were almost forced to have diversity because of black girls. Rock. And Bethann Hardison had town halls. They had forgotten that black girls matter. There would be there was a moment in paris fashion all over the world where you see all these fabulous runways and no black models and they had to be reminded that black people shop for clothes too. But when I went to paris the rise of the black model, it was an appreciation of the culture of blackness. It was that Mr Celeron remembered that josephine baker, also a fabulous woman of blackness from ST louis Missouri had to come to paris and she conquered the world with her unique talents of dancing, you know, chorus line review and becoming the star. So the culture of european culture embraced all ethnicities more so than they did in America. It's almost it's almost like pulling teeth sometimes in new york and particularly it's new york fashion. But as I say, people who are away ahead of the curve have always embraced black models and tom ford has always had the beauty is enjoy the beauty of black models, enjoy the beauty of blackmail and see models female models. He just was inspired by Pat Cleveland to do his Spring Summer collection which is amazingly optimistic, upbeat, exuberant and fresh, Lovely. And let's get into kind of I guess your experience at American Vogue when you were appointed the creative director of American Vogue in 1988, he became the highest ranking black person in fashion at that time. Did you feel any pressure about this monumental achievement after your appointment? I never felt any pressure. I was impression at all. I didn't have to think about my being black. I didn't go around thinking I'm black. I'm I'm fabulous. I'm a unique person. I've arrived at this clinical of my career. I think that in the 19 in 1980s the world was slightly different. The world was very successful and I felt it was equal ground and I owe much to ANna Winter. I owe my career without ANna Winter. She would name me the creative director. That is a landmark from ANna Winter and I I will always give her the respect. She's a great lady and a great lady of power in the fashion world. But she was a woman who was white who gave me the opportunity to shine and there was no pressure on me to exude blackness. I was just exuding smart. That's what I was exuding. And I think Anna went to tap into that because she had seen others tap into it. Andy Warhol, Diana Vreeland. She'd seen how people responded to my knowledge, not just because it's judy judy, judge judy Sheindlin would say They don't keep me here for my looks. They keep me here because I'm smart. So I may have looked like a certain kind of a person in the 70s, I don't look like now. But they kept me there because I was smart, Lovely. And in 1993, you were responsible for galvanizing support for John Galliano's runway show and collection a moment that changed the scope of the fashion industry. It was a breakthrough moment for the designer and he went on to become obviously creative director of and also home dear Dior, Can you give us some insight on what propelled you to make this happen and help make this happen. What propelled me to make the to reboot the john galliano career because he, his backers said backed up his partners, His financial partners had backed out was simply that my instinct told me that this was a man of poetic genius. If you want to compare he, if he will pour, he'd be both the letter. If you would pay until he'd be because so and instinctively my, I had, mine had been trained by the great and john Fairchild to see, to go to a preview and see or feel or sniff out if this is gonna be a mind breaking show of groundbreaking show, breaking news. So just told him and I got off the plane one night coming from Milan with Anna and I dropped her off. We shared a car at the ritz and I took the car onto john galliano's studio and it was almost like a Charles dickens scene. He was heating up, take out food in the Bunsen burner but in the corner, there was one dress and it spoke to me the emotions that I felt in that dress unfinished. Told me this was going to be a groundbreaking moment. I did not do this all single handed by myself. I had the entire team of vogue animal to support the financial support of the vogue petty cash in paris and the great help of a man named john bolt who was then at Painewebber and he came to paris on the concord and he gave john galliano the possibility to have a collection For $50,000. And now today that would not be possible, john galliano and I and his late uh man friday, Stephen Robinson ran around paris looking for places to have the show. And finally we, I came up with the greatest Possible place that it could have been shown was my late great friend, Charles Lindbergh who had been married to a great millionaire. And she, I said sal we want your house, we want to have a fashion show in your house. And her house was historical landmark house from the 18th century. And that show was put on, there were three floors and no models did the show for free. All the jewelers of paris cape diamonds for free. Alone them. And in those days no one had heard of showing real Cartier diamonds and guava and Harry Winston was ready to wear clothes. Manolo Blahnik did the shoes for free. The models did their the the hour, three hours uh you know, before the show for free, they had fun and then kate moss and Naomi Campbell and an evangelist. And this and that Nadia Arman made her big debut there. I remember john didn't want Nadia Orman, I said Nadia Arman has to be the show. She's got a big girl invoke, She's about to go to Helman Newton to be photographed if you don't have Nadia Armand vogue is not gonna be happy. I used it and I used it and she was in the show, she became a big star. And so we had two shows, we had the morning short, 9 30 we had the second short, 11 30 and it was it was a hit, a smash hit. John got his job at Givenchy as the first grader director at Givenchy and then he wouldn't have to be creative director before. And there we are, he's now at maison Margiela and my support, simply my mind's eye told me this is going to be a great, great, great collection. Everything happened for john after that john was sent to new york that same year Vogue paid for his coach ticket and put him up in a hotel and we, we used to go around together, john and I would go around to screens. I mean, we went to the screening of Schindler's List, we walked out, It was too, too much to take. We went to dinner with More to Us, which does not exist and john bolton was there and um it was just amazing. And then and Bass, the late ambassador, Art patron had her first galliano dress made and he fitted her dress In her library on 5th Ave and it was a bias cut dress. And so at that point, people who were influential that I knew, I would say john you've got to have a john galliano guest and he would go to the house and fit them special dresses, amazing. I love that story because I think that it just speaks to how you know how important it is to realize special moments and do everything you can to support people when they need you. And I think it's just amazing. Amazing. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much, inspiring, inspiring, very inspiring, very much. Um speaking of inspiring scarlet in the hood, um ager, a photoshoot featured in the May 1996 issue of Vanity Fair is one of my all time favorites. It's a reimagining of the film, Gone with the Wind uh and the photo shoot, styled and consented by you and shot by the late legendary Karl Lagerfeld. Are there any memories you can share about creating memories? Listen, it was perhaps my one masterpiece. Now I could have gone to vogue and done that. But Vanity Fair, I went to Carl, I went to uh and I said Carl, I've had this idea and I want to say to you Tommy, you can check this out. Um chronologically I did that before the novel that came out by this name. The woman's author's name is Alice Randall. The Wind Done Gone. I think that novel was published two years later. I had the idea before she published that novel. Great minds think alike. And I said to Carl what this came to me in the Ritz Hotel one night I'm sitting up in bed and there was a rerun of Gone with the Wind? And I said, oh my goodness! What if Naomi Campbell was Scarlett O'hara and Tyson Beckford with Red Butler. And what if Manila Blahnik was an enslaved person being in in in the in the garden pulling up onions or turnips or whatever. And I called Graydon carter and he said, I said, great! And I have this very, very challenging photo has said, we have to do Karl Lagerfeld was shooting at his home and around his home and outside and it's going to be the wind done, gone scarlet in the hood. He never flinched. He said, do it. He trusted me. That s a it was with couture clothes that have been shown in january, particularly the beginning of john galliano's first couture show as you want to see. Um That essay was critically reviewed by the late Amy Spindler and the fashion journalist in new york times. It was rave reviews somewhere. Have it framed somewhere in the closet, but it was just so much fun. It was over two days and nights because Carl works into the night. We had Naomi Campbell and scarlet in a gold dress that cost $200,000 from Chanel. We had John Galliano being a house servant. We had the great Manolo blahnik who flew over and I said, you know, you've got to come to paris, you've got to do an a student Carlos during the shoot and I want you as a gardener and gone with the Wind. I said the white people will be where the black people were in the film and the black people will be suddenly flipped the script and he said of course, of course, of course. And Manolo was the barefoot gardener with an apron, but the best, the best supporting actor with my friend, my late great friend and he was a friend. Gianfranco Ferrari. Now Gianfranco Ferrari wouldn't have done this. Were we not close friends? Gianfranco Ferrari was a very large man, hefty appetite and I said Gianfranco, I want you to be in this satire. I'm going, I'm going with the Wind. Yeah, of course. He uh he came to paris and he was then the designer at the critical tour. He arrived with a beautiful PK apron to the floor, custom made just for him and his size and on his head. He did a duo of maybe rag, like an aunt jemima style rag when he was a scarf and he was photographed cinching in Scarlett's waves. You know how adam McDaniels and feelings come on and these pictures were legendary. They are my favorite, it's one of my favorite favorite essays ever. You can get it on, you can look at it online. Just look for Scarlett in the hood vanity fair. Yes, it's so beautiful. And so I just, I just love, it's one of my favorite, it's one of my favorites too. It's one of my seeing the the celebration of blackness in an iconic and satirical way about this controversial movie that's now been suspended or put on hold at netflix or somewhere I don't know. But you know, who wrote that novel Gone With the Wind in some Southern lady, some southern white lady. You know, so it's not exactly depiction of the blacks in the film. That's accurate because those were hard, hard lives and hard existences. So we wanted to make a spoof of it. Mhm. I love it. Amazing, wonderful, beautiful story. Thank you so much for sharing that. Um And then 2020 has been a year that brought about obviously a global pandemic and a racial reckoning in the U. S. How do you feel the fashion industry will change as a result, do you think it will be more inclusive? Do you think it'll become more sustainable? I think it's going to be more inclusive. Yes, I see. Already looking at what little I've seen this week on 3 60 runway. I saw some man. I think he was out of Detroit. I don't know the name of his collection. But his election looked very, very fascinating inspired by what people wore on plantations. I think there's a lot of cotton and dinner cooks. It was reminded me very much of the kind of clothes you might see in a film called beguiled with Clint Eastwood and Geraldine page, which was about a white boarding school in the civil war and they eventually they cut his legs off etcetera. He dies. But the clothes were very innocent of kind of installation art. But they were wearable clothes for men and women and I think it's going to be more inclusive and I do think there's roles for everyone. Laquan smith is an incredible designer and I think he's gonna have a great career. He still has, he does have a great career. I think nothing will be normal as it was before. Nothing as you can. This is Fashion week and nothing is normal anymore. And I just tuned into what 3 60 runway C. F. D. A is doing. But that's got to be the exposure of the week. Yeah, I personally missed the events, but I think we'll hopefully get back to that. Well, I I miss lunches at same time bros breakfast breakfast clutches with Edward N Infeld. The most important man in fashion today. He is a black man from Ghana and he is the editor in chief of british folk. He has been there for three years. He's doing an outstanding job. He just did his september will cover and it's called activism. Last september hit The guest editor was making the duchess of suspects. He has broken the grounds for the way people will see fashion forever This summer or spring. He had a cover with an 85 year old woman as the cover girl. The woman was detained, judi Dench, you made her for Bond movies And from BBC and this was the groundbreaking no woman. And they've never had an 85 year old woman on the cover of American Vogue. You watch watch American vote will step in and find a woman. They did do and they used to do in August women by decades. They have women in the 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s and 70s. And on they've never put a woman on the cover with wrinkles the way Jane Jane Dooby Dench had. Now that was a breakthrough. And that is because of the black mind does not marginalize anything. The black mind out of his own marginalization and perhaps inequality and racial profiling believes and respects everything in life and every creed, Every age, no age shaming, nobody shaming judi Dench is not a thin woman, and it makes a difference. It upholds humanity. And you cannot say that even anna Winter gave a statement saying because of my intolerance, the lack of diversity has been my fault. And we're gonna make it up. She made an official statement. And that was an important statement to make in the middle of black lives matter. You've got to get up off our necks as reverend Al Sharpton said at the funeral of George Floyd in Minnesota. Just get up off our necks and let us be. I will never forget that unity or restoration reverend Al Sharpton who said such powerful words that day after first funeral of George Floyd, I shall never forget it Amazing. And then on the topic of the pandemic, there's been a lot of conversation around sustainability and fashion and over consumption. Do you think brands will begin to change their approaches to the creative process? Yes, absolute sustainability, Tony Goodman is a sustainable sustainability editor at vogue. I think you have to be made aware that, you know, there are carbon imprints in the world, you know, fires to hurricanes are more frequent. We are the world, we don't know where we're going. We don't know where I wake up everyday wondering where am I going to end up in two months because I have no clue. I have to watch. I have to be careful of the covid. I have to be careful if if if the election goes the other way and if that dude in the White House gets reelected, I can't, I can't afford to go run off to Europe and live like James Baldwin did when he was young, he ran off with $48 and lived in Paris and lived in France when he died in the south of France and ST. Jones. I just can't do that. You can't afford to to pack up and just run away. So I think that it's a very transitional moment in our world on all levels. Fashion will never be the same. I just got an email from the Directors of Chanel couture today and we were supposed to have a meeting this september and she said, but can you believe it or not? I'm doing my fittings on on on virtual virtual virtual thing. Skype or zoom or whatever the way she's doing a fitting the way we are talking, you know? Yeah. I was actually speaking to Romeo Hunt earlier this week and he was talking about his whole process of doing fittings and doing um going to market showing buyers his collection virtually. Um definitely changing moment for us all in fashion. Um also obviously you've been to very many matt Dallas Do you have a favorite met gala theme or year? I don't have a favorite thing but I have a favorite moment. That moment was Rihanna when she walked in the step in that beautiful cake and I called her the black frozen. She was an aspiration and inspiration from this moment of young black girls. That kate from was just a moment. She researched it on mine and she arrived as she unfurled her installation moment, Her performance art. This was perfection. That is the moment that will always stand out to me. The other moment was my first met ball under Diana Vreeland In December of 1970. For when Cher was in her Bob Mackie Iridescent plumed, full transparent jumpsuit walking around with her sister and people were then smoking in the galleries as they watched the things that we're looking at them in the exhibit, You can't smoke it now in the mat you don't have him with share, lighting up a cigarette and looking at her clothes from, you know, bob mackie and a share show The Sonny and Cher Show share and Rihanna. It goes from 1974 to the moment of Rihanna. Those are my favorite moments. Amazing. What do you think about her moment at the 2018 met gala with the the Catholicism inspired garden? It was beautiful. I think it was by john galliano, wasn't it on? Yeah. Anything she does is great with sweet. She was great when she had to come into God's own dress. It looked like a house like a victorian house in brussels. So her choices are beautiful and her choices are unique. And she is a very powerful inspiration for women of all color and women of all ages today. Everything she does. Yes, absolutely. And then what are your, what are your thoughts on fashion journalism today? Obviously it's changed a lot with the digital, you know, kind of shifting from print to digital and like obviously the revenue implications with that. I don't have many. No, I just think journalism in in general, I don't follow the fashion pages that much anymore. I follow individuals who impacted my life tom ford. I follow him closely and we emailed marc Jacobs. I follow him closely. I love what he does. I love his instagram. I think fashion journalists are not dead and it's not extinct. But everybody is a fashion editor on instagram. Everybody edits their lives, marc Jacobs can serve every morning how he does it. I don't know, he comes with a new outfit and he lists all these things mickey, mickey, mickey, moto pearls, blah blah blah, Celine shoes, boots, blah blah blah Marcel had all of this. Everyone's a fashion editor. Everyone, everyone is a fashion editor. I think that every NFL is the only person I follow in fashion because I like him and I think he's great, I think he's doing a great job at british vogue and he's gonna make a difference and people are going to follow him and being inspired by him. I agree. And um are there any up and coming designers that you're kind of looking out? I mean obviously you mentioned like smith earlier, but there was people like Kirby genre mont with Pierre Moss and there's Anita um there's so many up and coming coming in specifically also black designers who are really making a splash right now. I wish them all well and I particularly like Laquan smith because I also mentioned him and I gave him Before, he had a second show, $2,000 to go to Paris and I said take this money and go to Paris. I gave him a check. I said take this money and go to paris. I'm not saying you have to do one thing, just go to paris and you can sit down and have a croissant a cup of coffee and just look at the way the sun hits the buildings and come home and you'll be done. You've done your job lovely. Amazing. That's wonderful. Um, and if you could go back and and tell your, your adolescent self, uh, something that would impact you in your, in, you know, in your adulthood, what would that be? Be more confident? I had great confidence. I would say you're good, be confident. You, you don't have to wear it. You don't have to have any insecurity. You're confident. You're knowledgeable, you know how to communicate well, you're articulate and I would say probably exercise more and watch the calories. And then in the book, you speak about the Obama inauguration and you talk about how that impacted you and how the Obama administration was, you know, very important moment for that only you, but also for our country. I'm just gonna read a bit of a piece of the book. It says today, we can proudly say we've had our first african American president, first lady. Yes, Obama embodies the audacity of hope. Yes, there was a great progress and we're all proud to recognize this, but in the end due to the sustained role of the status quo from films to politics to the arts. A black man must still be smarter than any white person to ascend to the top of his field. He must also be smart enough to navigate through all the storms, the tornadoes, earthquakes. The struggle for black equality is a constant challenge. It takes daily individual skirmishes to survive by hope and faith to conquer all the inbred brace problems through the power of love. President Barack Obama and brilliant Michelle Obama gave me a renewed optimism, faith and determination to continue to survive with the usual force and fanfare and aplomb I have sustained throughout my life. Um, can you just expand that a bit more in terms of not expanding it? Tommy. It's not said there. You read it, You read the most wonderful classes from the book you saw so that the greatest passage that perhaps could be shared with your viewers Spectators for this. I said it there, I wrote it and I felt it and that says it all for me. Amazing. Amazing. Amazing. Um, and then do you have any particular thoughts that you may want to share about politics today? I just want to share that. We must make plans to vote. You have to absolutely be vigilant. You don't just take it casually, you should already have made a plan to vote, find out where you can vote where you live and you make sure that you get out and vote if you are voted and if there's trying to hinder you to vote, you stand. Some people have to stand in line for 678 hours as Michelle Obama said, take a chair and a snack. You might have to sit there, take a folding chair and just sit and demand your right to vote. That's what I say about politics today. Every day you wake up it will now, 50 days out. You stop listening to the noise on television, you just zoom out that noise and you look at some old film like laura which is on now in TCM or the anatomy of a murder with jimmy Stewart or diane carroll in paris blues. Or even I hope they show Diana ross in Lady sings the blues. They did show it recently earlier this summer, Or Diana Ross in Mahogany where she designed all the clothes. Diana Ross designed the costumes in Mahogany in 1975, chill out. Look at the movie and just playing your vote and plan your vote because the vote will change the whole situation would be a matter of voting for democracy or an autocracy whether you vote or not. I'm not saying who to vote for, but you know who to vote for. Absolutely. Um and what inspired you to write your memoir? I always inspired, I had written the first one, I wrote my first memoir in 2004, A. L. G. A memoir. This came up to me after my documentary, The hospital called DeAndre came out and my literary agent, David Vigilante came up to me and we met and he we got together with my editor thomas flannery Jr we made a proposal and the first David went out to shop the proposal. I got a call on saturday morning and they said, valentine penguin, random house books pam Cannon would like to make you a preemptive offer. In other words, if you accept this offer, you don't have to go see anyone else. And I did. And what inspired me was perhaps that I got that deal. And I wanted to tell the truth and I wanted to tell the truth about my whole life. I included my sexual abuse as a child. I had never spoken to anyone about my sexual abuse. I couldn't tell my grandmother in those days. I wouldn't like it would have killed her. If I had told my grandmother, it would have killed her. It would have killed her. She could drop dead. And I was shamed and shamed. I couldn't have gone to tell my teachers or my guidance counselor. It would have killed my grandmother. I did not want my grandmother to know. And when I realized what had happened to me and I was ashamed of it. And it happened over cereal. I said, I can't let my grandmother know this shell. It will she'll just she'll just, it was just, it will be the second greatest shock in her life and I respected and loved my grandmother too much. So I just feel that it's very important that you tell the truth. You'll be honest. And the truth will win out. The truth will win out. I can imagine that it was a very freeing and cathartic experience. No, it wasn't. It was not a free cathartic experience. I'm still suffering today. My emotional scars are never, I'm never gonna go away. But I survived. I have survived it strongly through my face Psalms 91 Very important to me And Matthew 11 Chapter 11: verse 30. His yoke is easy and his burden is light. These are my mentors, Precious Lord. Take my hand. Written by Thomas Dorsey. The greatest gospel songwriter of the 20th century song by Mahalia Jackson. Song by Marian Anderson, sung by Aretha franklin, but also sung by James baldwin. If you can find it are Capello. When I discovered that two weeks ago and I was down and I woke up and saw this of my texting, oh my God, it changed my whole world. James baldwin singing a cappella Precious Lord. It is equivalent to something. It is extraordinary as Mahalia Jackson. So Black exceptionalism and black excellence. We'll take you high. Anything else? I think I've said it all. Thank you. I mean, I am very inspired by you always uh inspired after our conversation today. This has been well, you've done a great job. You did your research and homework and I applaud that and you're wonderful and thank you for this too. I thank you for this opportunity. I mean, I say good luck and hers with Samir. Samir was at vogue and she came to me the other day, I'm like email tried to congratulate her and she said, I don't know if you remember, but you came to my office when I was working for grace cards in the beginning and said I want to pronounce your name correctly, how do you say it? And she said, you know, that moment made her feel welcome, she felt like she was at home, good luck with Samira, the first black editor of Yes, we are very proud and I'm proud to work at a company that is, you know, so leading the charge in terms of Yes, yes, very important, very important. Yes, thank you, thank you, thank you andre for your kind words and thank you all for joining us today. And lastly before we go, I definitely want to obviously share with everyone that Mr Mr tally's book the chiffon trenches, you could find it on every platform online, obviously, and in bookstores um and mr charlie, is there anything that you would like to share with us before we go, I'd like to say thank you for this great privilege and opportunity and hello to Oprah. Well, it's always an inspiration and uh by the way, my book is in the new york times bestseller list, it was number six and I'm proud of that being a black man in this climate, in this climate with political books out, I mean that book, Mr Cohen's book is number one, what's it called, betrayal or something and then mary trump's book, all those books override everything but my book got on the bestseller list of me and I'm proud of that, I'm eating this mask, but I'm very proud of that and I really am proud to talk to you, I'm always very wonderful to talk to a person like you, a person who is young who is excited and who is inspired by hopefully exceptionalist. Well I'm inspired by your exception exceptionalism and just again, thank you for paving the way for me and so many others like me and so many of her so many across the board and not only fashion and fashion journalism, but just in corporate America and everywhere we thank you we honor you and it is just a privilege to even speak to you right now. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Keep in touch almost definitely keep in touch. I will definitely keep in touch thank you so much. And with that I will just give you all a bit about hearst black culture obviously uh in partnership with Oprah magazine, we put on this interview and HPC as an employee resource group, hearst magazine founded in 2019 like Irene Davis Sandy Pierre and myself and our mission is to serve as a networking organization obviously for black employees at the company, across all the visions and we aim to amplify black voices and perspectives through storytelling, advocacy, recruitment and events Thank you so much. Uh, Andre and I wish you all the best, Nothing but the best. And with that, and we will go thank you and be blessed, prayed up. Stay prayed up. We have to thank you so much. Thank you. Bye bye. Alright, bye. Have a good one.

Influential fashion journalist André Leon Talley dies at 73

Updated: 3:39 AM EST Jan 19, 2022

André Leon Talley, the towering former creative director and editor at large of Vogue magazine, has died. He was 73.Talley's literary agent David Vigliano confirmed Talley's death to USA Today late Tuesday, but no additional details were immediately available. Talley was an influential fashion journalist who worked at Women's Wear Daily and Vogue and was a regular in the front row of fashion shows in New York and Europe. At 6-feet-6 inches tall, Talley cut an imposing figure wherever he went, with his stature, his considerable influence on the fashion world, and his bold looks.In a 2013 Vanity Fair spread titled "The Eyeful Tower," Talley was described as "perhaps the industry's most important link to the past." Designer Tom Ford told the magazine Talley was "one of the last great fashion editors who has an incredible sense of fashion history. … He can see through everything you do to the original reference, predict what was on your inspiration board."Designer Diane von Furstenberg praised Talley on Instagram, writing: "no one saw the world in a more glamorous way than you did … no one was grander and more soulful than you were."In his 2003 memoir, "A.L.T.: A Memoir," Talley focused on two of the most important women in his life: his maternal grandmother, Bennie Frances Davis and the late fashion editor Diana Vreeland."Bennie Frances Davis may have looked like a typical, African American domestic worker to many of the people who saw her on an ordinary day, but I, who could see her soul, could also see her secret: that even while she wore a hair net and work clothes to scrub toilets and floors, she wore an invisible diadem," he wrote.His relationship with Vogue started at Duke University, where his grandmother cleaned dorms; Talley would walk to campus in his youth to read the magazine.Talley was also a familiar figure to TV audiences, serving as a judge on "America's Top Model" and appearing on "Sex and the City" and "Empire."Raised in Durham, North Carolina, Talley worked assorted jobs before arriving in New York in the 1970s, soon meeting Vreeland striking up a friendship that lasted until her death in 1989.Talley worked as a park ranger in Washington, D.C., and Maryland, where he told visitors about slaves who built Fort Washington and dressed up like a Civil War soldier, he told The Associated Press in 2003.After stints with Interview magazine and Women's Wear Daily, Talley was hired at Vogue in 1983 by Editor in Chief Anna Wintour and was appointed its creative director in 1988.Talley released another memoir in 2020, "The Chiffon Trenches," that included gossipy behind-the-scenes tales about Wintour and other fashion figures like the late designer Karl Lagerfeld.Of all the elements of a person's apparel, Talley considered shoes to be most important."You can tell everything about a person by what he puts on his feet," Talley told the AP."If it's a man and you can see the reflection of his face on the top of his black shoes, it means they've been polished to perfection. … If it's a woman and she's wearing shoes that hurt … well, shoes that hurt are very fashionable!"Talley's death was first reported by celebrity website TMZ.

NEW YORK —

André Leon Talley, the towering former creative director and editor at large of Vogue magazine, has died. He was 73.

Talley's literary agent David Vigliano confirmed Talley's death to USA Today late Tuesday, but no additional details were immediately available.

Talley was an influential fashion journalist who worked at Women's Wear Daily and Vogue and was a regular in the front row of fashion shows in New York and Europe. At 6-feet-6 inches tall, Talley cut an imposing figure wherever he went, with his stature, his considerable influence on the fashion world, and his bold looks.

In a 2013 Vanity Fair spread titled "The Eyeful Tower," Talley was described as "perhaps the industry's most important link to the past." Designer Tom Ford told the magazine Talley was "one of the last great fashion editors who has an incredible sense of fashion history. … He can see through everything you do to the original reference, predict what was on your inspiration board."

Designer Diane von Furstenberg praised Talley on Instagram, writing: "no one saw the world in a more glamorous way than you did … no one was grander and more soulful than you were."

In his 2003 memoir, "A.L.T.: A Memoir," Talley focused on two of the most important women in his life: his maternal grandmother, Bennie Frances Davis and the late fashion editor Diana Vreeland.

"Bennie Frances Davis may have looked like a typical, African American domestic worker to many of the people who saw her on an ordinary day, but I, who could see her soul, could also see her secret: that even while she wore a hair net and work clothes to scrub toilets and floors, she wore an invisible diadem," he wrote.

His relationship with Vogue started at Duke University, where his grandmother cleaned dorms; Talley would walk to campus in his youth to read the magazine.

Talley was also a familiar figure to TV audiences, serving as a judge on "America's Top Model" and appearing on "Sex and the City" and "Empire."

Raised in Durham, North Carolina, Talley worked assorted jobs before arriving in New York in the 1970s, soon meeting Vreeland striking up a friendship that lasted until her death in 1989.

Talley worked as a park ranger in Washington, D.C., and Maryland, where he told visitors about slaves who built Fort Washington and dressed up like a Civil War soldier, he told The Associated Press in 2003.

After stints with Interview magazine and Women's Wear Daily, Talley was hired at Vogue in 1983 by Editor in Chief Anna Wintour and was appointed its creative director in 1988.

Talley released another memoir in 2020, "The Chiffon Trenches," that included gossipy behind-the-scenes tales about Wintour and other fashion figures like the late designer Karl Lagerfeld.

Of all the elements of a person's apparel, Talley considered shoes to be most important.

"You can tell everything about a person by what he puts on his feet," Talley told the AP.

"If it's a man and you can see the reflection of his face on the top of his black shoes, it means they've been polished to perfection. … If it's a woman and she's wearing shoes that hurt … well, shoes that hurt are very fashionable!"

Talley's death was first reported by celebrity website TMZ.