Alright everyone, gird your loins! Anna Wintour's new biography has dropped!
Fashion journalist Amy Odell cataloged Wintour's rise within the fashion world, detailing her childhood and early career. "Anna" gives insight into Wintour's thirty-four (and counting) year reign as Vogue's editor-in-chief.
Wintour "respectfully declined" to be interviewed for the book, but Odell shared that she was was "provided with contact information for some of her colleagues and friends." The author spoke with over two hundred and fifty sources, including some of Wintour's former personal assistants.
Wintour's assistants described what it was really like to work for the woman who inspired Meryl Streep's iconic performance in the hit movie, "The Devil Wears Prada," which was based on the best selling book by Lauren Weisberger, a departed aide of Wintour's.
According to Odell, when Wintour first read the 2003 novel, she "was sort of bemused" and "wasn't bothered by it at all." A friend of hers elaborated,
"I don't think Anna is as interested in the cultural phenomenon that she is as the rest of us are."
Still, a lot of the details from the book were taken from real life. Wintour reportedly had two to three assistants at a time, who began their days at 7a.m., and often ended up working twelve hour shifts. One notes losing eight pounds in her first two weeks under Wintour.
There was also an "unspoken" dress code in the office. While Wintour never told staff what to wear, it was clear that she had certain expectations. One former aide explained,
"She would glare at whatever I was wearing. It wasn't a glare like approval. It was sort of, 'What the hell is that?' You could definitely tell when she was like, 'Why would you put those pants with that top?'"
Odell reported that Wintour would screen every person who interviewed for a job at Vogue by checking their outfits before hiring them. Still, according to some, Wintour was "as cool as a cucumber," with one former employee recalling,
"A lot of those women at Vogue were terrifying. I don't remember her being terrifying. She got the work done and she was pleasant."
"Anna: The Biography" is on sale now.
