This week the world lost André Leon Talley, the creative genius who stood out as the rare Black editor able to penetrate the exclusive ranks of high fashion. The icon, author, and former creative director of Vogue died Tuesday at the age of 73.
I spoke to Teri Agins, a contemporary and friend of Talley who covered the fashion industry for years for the Wall Street Journal, about this “irreverent, grand, and so very complicated” figure.
Katie Couric: Teri, can you tell me what you thought when you learned of André’s passing?
Teri Agins: The one thing that I think really gets lost in a lot of these tributes of André is that in the 70s, he was the Paris bureau chief for Women’s Wear Daily. He was a stellar journalist. He spoke French, so he could interview Yves Saint Laurent or Givenchy in fluent French. And he was a connoisseur of technique and couture; he had an encyclopedic knowledge of fashion. We always looked forward to one of André’s feature profiles, because they made you feel like you were an insider in this rarified fashion world. That was his claim to fame.
How do you think he became so interested in fashion, and how did he develop such an extensive knowledge of the industry?
I think he was like every other kid who grew up interested in fashion, from designers to journalists: We all had subscriptions to Vogue. We all paged through that magazine. You talk to Isaac Mizrahi, or any other designer — they all talk about having that Vogue magazine subscription. And André was a dreamer.
He started off as an unpaid intern for the legendary Diana Vreeland at the Metropolitan Museum Costume Institute. Vreeland, of course, was the founder of the Met Ball, which was called the “Party of the Year.”
He was also raised by old-school Black people who dressed up when they went to church, with gloves and hats. And even though his mother didn’t have an extensive wardrobe, these people were really refined. He also did a major in French literature at North Carolina Central University and received his master’s degree in French lit at Brown. So once he started to mix and mingle with high society, he fit in.
He’s being celebrated now for everything he did for representation in fashion. Tell me about his contributions as both a Black and a gay man in fashion.
I talked to him about this often, and he kept saying that he really did not see color. Just by the fact that he was there, in that rarefied world, which was extremely exclusionary and WASPy — for him to penetrate that was a very big deal. But he did not pick race as an issue. He was a fashion icon, and that’s what he wanted to be known for.
He was clearly loved, when you look at all the eulogies and tributes that have poured in. What was it about André that has prompted this tidal wave of love and appreciation?
He was the first Black person who had ever ascended to those heights of fashion. And he was also joined at the hip with Vogue Editor-in-Chief Anna Wintour, who championed him early on. He, in turn, schooled her on all the finer points of fashion history. So they were a really good team — personally and professionally.
But André was also an enigma, a complicated guy. This is a man who, at the end, with all his exposure and everything he had written, was not very wealthy. He lived for the moment, and he was grand and flamboyant and fun. And that was much of the mystique of fashion.
He also had an affiliation with SCAD, the Savannah College of Art and Design, where he was a trustee. And every year since 2000, SCAD awarded a lifetime achievement award named after André. That attracted recipients through the years like Karl Lagerfeld, Vera Wang, Oscar de la Renta, Tom Ford, Miuccia Prada, and Marc Jacobs. Can you imagine how exciting that was for those students?
André was unique. He was a true original who had the swagger and the flair. From his Saville Row suits to his haute couture caftans, he always made a statement.
