Capes, Maxicoats and Kaftans - A Retrospective on André Leon Talley

On January 18th, 2022, the fashion industry lost one of its most important pioneers. André Leon Talley passed away at the age of 73. But who was the cape-carrying man that had a colossal impact on how we perceive fashion today?

“To my twelve-year-old self, raised in the segregated South, the idea of a black man playing any kind of role in this world seemed an impossibility. To think of where I’ve come from, where we’ve come from, in my lifetime, and where we are today, is amazing.” - The Chiffon Trenches, André Leon Talley

Born in the American south in 1948, André Leon Talley was raised by his grandmother in Durham North Carolina. Although difficult, he views his formative years as incredibly impactful, his grandmother did not only raise him, but she was also one of the most influential people apart from his later mentors.

He was immensely impacted by her as well as southern culture, the most important thing in life for them back then was going to church on Sundays. Church congregations were crucial for the development of African American communities during Jim Crow, when segregation laws permeated nearly every aspect of life.

It was at his local public library that Talley discovered his love for fashion, style, and the arts. Talley poured over every possible Vogue magazine he would come across. In his 2020 memoir, Talley writes that “My world became the glossy pages of Vogue, where I could read about Truman Capote’s legendary ball, given at the Plaza, in honor of Katharine Graham. And Gloria Vanderbilt, in her patchwork antique quilts with Elizabethan ruffs, created by Adolfo.” However, fashion didn’t become his main focus just yet.

Talley went on to study at an all-Black university in North Carolina, where he excelled and wound up with a full scholarship to Brown University in Rhode Island. Brown was the place where Talley was finally reborn. He pursued French studies and became immersed in the literature, culture, and language, becoming fluent in French by the time he graduated. A self-proclaimed fashion addict with a taste for the extravagant, Talley joined the crowds of Rhode Island School of Design and became friends with young, affluent, and artsy New Yorkers who eventually introduced him to the fashion world of the city. After a party following a Fashion Institute of Technology show, Talley decided to stop working on his doctorate degree and to follow his true passion. Shortly after, he was hired as a volunteer to assist Diana Vreeland at the Metropolitan Museum of Art; she was so impressed by him that she made him her “helper” until the end of the FIT show. This was the start of a life-long friendship and mentorship between Talley and Vreeland. In Talley’s own words: “Diana Vreeland gave me the confidence and the grandeur and the boldness to be who I was.”

Vreeland proceeded to make sure Talley’s career got going; she wrote letters to her own contacts in the industry, ranging from Oscar de la Renta and Diane Von Füurstenberg to Halston and Liza Minelli, telling them all about her new, young, and promising friend. He eventually started working for Andy Warhol’s Magazine, Interview, adjacent to Warhol’s factory, and continued his integration into New York City’s ‘70s art landscape, becoming a regular at the most exclusive venues and events of the time, such as Studio 54.

“When I was an adolescent, Vogue was my inspiration. When other kids were tacking up baseball cards to their bedroom walls, mine were filled with the pages of the world’s most influential fashion magazine.” - The Chiffon Trenches, André Leon Talley

Talley first interviewed for Vogue in 1980, when he met up with then-editor-in-chief Grace Mirabella, the successor of his friend and Mentor Diana Vreeland. Through the intimidating interview process, Talley got the impression that she saw him as flamboyant as well as superficial; she initially dismissed him. After seeing a video of Talley interviewing his dear friend Karl Lagerfeld, Mirabella called Talley back two years after their initial meeting to offer him a job. It was on his way out of this interview as one of Vogue's new fashion news editors that he met Anna Wintour for the first time. She had just joined Vogue as its new creative director. Talley admitted being terrified of her, but little did he know that she would become one of his lifelong friends and allies.

“Friendship with him meant being part of his erudite, gilded, and fiercely self-created existence” - Anna Wintour

Every year, Talley and Wintour traveled through the different fashion weeks together, attended shows, galas and parties together. Wintour still to this says that he was the person she’d rely upon whenever she needed fashion history intel, as he had a far greater knowledge of it than her. Although Talley initially left Vogue in 1995, he continuously collaborated with the magazine, mostly conducting interviews, among others on the Met Gala red carpet and hosting Vogue's official podcast. His friendship with Wintour soured when she gradually removed him from his positions at Vogue without personally contacting him.

Following their falling-out, Talley scathed in his 2020 memoir that Anna Wintour was incapable of any kind of “simple human kindness.” Nonetheless, Anna Wintour addressed their life-long friendship in an article upon his death, saying that “Amidst a lifetime of memories of André, I will never forget his kindness, his chivalry, and his friendship.” Although tumultuous, their relationship was one of a kind, they were not fierce competitors, they were companions.

“André Leon Talley was a one-of-a-kind presence who changed the face of fashion and beauty for a generation of girls just like me. He will be missed, but I know his legacy will continue inspiring people for years to come.” -Michelle Obama

Although he escaped the Jim Crow south early on in his life, having been the victim of discrimination, to the point of having stones thrown at him while he was getting his monthly Vogue, Talley continued to suffer from racial discrimination all through his career. Even in his success, Talley found himself at a lower pay grade than his white colleagues. While his fellow senior editors at Vogue were making nearly $1 million a year, his salary was less than half of theirs: $300,000. He also had an influential role in the portrayal of people of color within fashion, he was often the only Black man sitting front row at major fashion shows, especially in the 1980s. Throughout his life, he continued to push for models of color to be on the pages of the publications he was currently working for. Through the power he found in fashion, he defied its classist and racist tendencies.

From the first military surplus cape he bought on a trip to New York City, to his collection of Tom Ford caftans, Talley used fashion as his weapon, his armor. From his early days in North Carolina, to his later life in White Plains, where he went from wearing custom Reed Evins smoking shoes to the more casual but nevertheless trendy pairs of Ugg’s that he lovingly called "comfort food for my feet .”

Talley spent his last years at his White Planes estate in New York, his death sparked a string of tributes from some of the most important people in fashion, politics, and the arts. His career and achievements have been of immeasurable proportions for the fashion industry. The man in the cape will never be forgotten.