Grace Coddington

I first became familiar with Grace Coddington in the documentary THE SEPTEMBER ISSUE.  I was a fan of her styling in Vogue, but unaware she was the vision behind the some of the magazine's most inspired layouts. I just finished her breezy memoir, less a confessional, and more an insider's look at the industry beginning with her teenage years as a model in London, and then as an editor.  This was the career I aspired to when I graduated from college.  Although I had a few interviews at GQ, my first job was at Barneys in the PR department where part of my day was spent fact checking magazine layouts, and signing out clothes and accessories for photo shoots.  I didn't enjoy the superficiality of the industry, or my horrific boss, and soon found myself in another field.   However, for the past two decades magazines were my obsession.  In my small NY apartment back issues lined bookshelves, for I was unwilling to part with iconic covers and artistic fashion spreads.  Anna Wintour's first cover at American Vogue was certainly in that pile.

What I couldn't have known then, and what the memoir unintentionally underscores, is that the industry has peaked.  My fashion itch is easily scratched in the blogosphere, and even thought I still subscribe to Vogue, I have several months worth of issues that I haven't yet cracked.  The pile by my nightstand no longer represents something I can't part with, but a fading industry replaced by technology.