André Leon Talley, Editor-At-Large for US Vogue, is a singular character in the upper echelons of the fashion world. Standing at 6 ft. 7 inches and barrel chested, he is Anna Wintour’s ostentatiously dressed second in command.
Talley is often photographed beside Wintour on the front row of high profile catwalk shows, frequently sporting some outrageous couture coat or indoor umbrella. Known for his love of Napoleon hats and Fendi furs, Talley has always been a clotheshorse and boasts a closet full of size 13 Manolo Blahniks.
His was not a childhood of abject poverty. "We always had clothes to wear and food on the table," he writes in his autobiography A.L.T, "but we lived on limited means. Our roof leaked buckets of water when the snow melted.” He was raised by his grandmother, who gave him an “understanding of luxury”. It would stay with him throughout his life and propel him to succeed in the fashion world.
Talley’s love for beautiful clothes was also fostered by his regular attendance to Church: "You saw beautiful images of women, beautiful church hats and gloves. These were not people of great means and wealth, but they had the most wonderful style—especially on Sundays." He was his grandmother’s only grandchild and perhaps because of their close bond he chose to pursue fashion and the quest for luxury as a career.
Owing to the unrest of the pre Civil Rights years, Talley has pushed for equal rights within the fashion industry, chastising designers for not using women of colour on the runway. Considering his past and now flamboyant means of attire, Talley may be reacting to his experiences in North Carolina where black people were socially repressed and expected to remain practically invisible in the public eye.
And by tipping the scales at more than 20 stone, you’re never going to be invisible… Karl Lagerfeld designed him a coat "you could put a whole Lilliputian family in". But he later slimmed down due to health reasons under Wintour’s guidance.
Talley notoriously arrived at Isabella Blow’s funeral wearing a Chanel haute couture navy taffeta cloak with a 12 ft. train. Was this a tribute or an upstaging of Blow? Who knows, but either way Blow was probably applauding his flamboyance from beyond the grave.
Words: Catherine McColl
Illustration: Federica Ubaldo