Photo: Gregory Pace/BeImages.Anna Wintour is off the hook it seems. Turns out the mastermind behind Vogue's April cover featuring Kim Kardashian and Kanye West — perhaps you've seen it? — was one Grace Coddington.
The 73-year-old style icon and Vogue creative director made the confession in a new interview with the Financial Times. As she tells it, Coddington pushed to get the couple in the fashion magazine, and personally styled the controversial shoot.
“There was a wedding story to be done,” Coddington says. “And, Anna probably had them in mind, because she had been seeing a lot of Kanye, so she said, ‘Maybe we should shoot it on lookalikes.’ And I thought, ‘Why not just do it on the real thing? This is Vogue.’ And I do think Kim Kardashian represents this moment in our culture. I’m fascinated by her, in the same way I’m fascinated by the people I see on the street or the subway.” Um, we think that's meant to be a compliment.
Indeed, the flame-haired creative director has lots of praise for the Kimye family. “It was fun," she says. "[Kim] is very professional. And the baby [North] is very well-behaved. We did millions of pictures and she did not cry once. I got quite upset we did not have the baby on the cover.”
Of course, there has been some fallout from readers who found the cover subjects to be inappropriate. Coddington, however, pays them little mind. "I knew going in it would be controversial — I got an envelope from Texas, with the cover ripped up into little pieces inside — but the designers all sent me flowers, so I guess they were happy.” As if anyone could be mad at our Grace. (Financial Times)