Washington – André Leon Talley, the former editor of the US edition of “Vogue” and international fashion legend, died this Tuesday at the age of 73.
Talley’s literary agent, David Vigliano, confirmed his death to USA Today on Tuesday night, but no additional details were immediately available.
During her career, Talley wrote for a large number of publications such as “Women’s Wear Daily”, “W” and even “The New York Times”, but her work in the American edition of “Vogue” brought her to fame.
He was also a familiar figure to television audiences, serving as a judge on “America’s Top Model” and appearing on “Sex and the City” and “Empire.”
He was the magazine’s chief information officer, its creative director and one of its senior editors, which led him to work closely with Anna Wintour, the editor-in-chief of Vogue USA.
Born in 1948 in the US capital, Talley broke the mold of the time and became the most powerful African-American in the world of fashion.
She grew up with her grandmother in North Carolina at a time when racial segregation marked life in the American South and, at just nine or ten years old, she showed an interest in fashion by reading “Vogue” magazines in the local library and seeing how African-American women dressed for church on Sundays.
He studied French literature at Brown University (Rhode Island) and, in 1974, was discovered by the then editor of the American version of “Vogue”, Diana Vreeland, who got him a job at the legendary New York studio “Factory” of the eccentric Andy Warhol. .
Since then, Talley immersed himself in fashion to become one of the most high-profile African-Americans in the industry.
With an explosive personality and almost two meters tall, Talley was in the front row of the most prestigious fashion shows in New York, Paris, London and Milan for almost three decades.
During all that time, he championed the need for greater racial diversity not only on runways with models, but also among designers, executives, and magazine editors.
With information from EFE and AP.
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