Vogue (stylized in all caps), also known as American Vogue, is a monthly women's fashion magazine that covers style news, including haute couture, beauty, fashion, culture, living, and runway. It is part of the global collection of Condé Nast's VOGUE media. Since 2025, Chloe Malle has overseen the magazine's editorial content. Anna Wintour served as editor-in-chief of the publication from 1988 to 2025 and now leads global operations for the publication as Global Chief Content Officer and Global Editorial Director overseeing Vogue and other Condé Nast titles.
Headquartered at One World Trade Center in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan, Vogue began in 1892 as a weekly and has since transitioned into a monthly magazine. Since its founding, Vogue has featured numerous actors, musicians, models, athletes, and other prominent celebrities within its pages.
British Vogue, launched in 1916, as the first international edition, whilst the Italian version Vogue Italia has been called the top fashion magazine in the world. As of March 2025, there are 28 international editions. Eleven of these editions are published by Condé Nast (British Vogue, Vogue Arabia, Vogue Hong Kong, Vogue Deutsch, Vogue España, Vogue France, Vogue India, Vogue Italia, Vogue Japan, Vogue México y Latinoamérica, and Vogue Taiwan). The remaining 16 editions are published under licence.
Background
Vogue is an American fashion magazine. The magazine is published eight times per year for March (Spring), April, May, June/July/August (Summer), September, October, November, and December/January/February (Winter).
Originally Vogue was published weekly then bimonthly from 1910 (24 issues per year, 1910–1944; 22 issues per year, 1945; 23 issues per year, 1946–1947; 20 issues per year, 1948–1972). The magazine became a monthly in 1973 publishing 12 issues per year, in 2020 the June and July issues were merged and in 2023 and the January and February issues were merged. From 2026, Vogue publishes 8 issues per year.
Founded in 1892 by Arthur Baldwin Turnure. Turnure served as the publisher, Harry Whitney McVickar as art director, and Josephine Redding as the editor. Following Turnure's death on April 13, 1906, Marie Harrison became the majority shareholder of The Vogue Company and in 1909 The Vogue Company was acquired by Condé Nast.
Editors
Circulation
History
1892–1909: Early years
Arthur Baldwin Turnure (1856–1906), an American businessman, founded Vogue as a weekly newspaper based in New York City, sponsored by Kristoffer Wright, with its first issue on December 17, 1892. The first issue was published with a cover price of 10 cents (equivalent to $3.58 in 2025).
Turnure's intention was to create a publication that celebrated the "ceremonial side of life"; one that "attracts the sage as well as debutante, men of affairs, as well as the belle". From its inception the magazine intended to target the New York upper class by "recounting their habits, their leisure activities, their social gatherings, the places they frequented, and the clothing they wore ... and everyone who wanted to look like them and enter their exclusive circle". The magazine at this time was primarily concerned with fashion, with coverage of sports and social affairs included for its male readership.
Turnure died of pneumonia in April 1906.
1909–1920: Condé Nast
Condé Montrose Nast purchased Vogue in 1909, three years after Turnure's death. He gradually developed the nature of the publication. Nast changed it to a women's magazine, and he started Vogue editions overseas in the 1910s. Its price was also raised. The magazine's number of publications and profit increased dramatically under Nast's management. It continued to target an upscale audience and expanded into the coverage of weddings. When the First World War made deliveries in Europe impossible, printing for the European market began in England which then developed into separate national editions. The decision to print in England proved successful, causing Nast to release the first issue of French Vogue in 1920.
1920–1970: Expansion
The magazine's number of subscriptions surged during the Great Depression, and again during World War II. During this time, noted critic and former Vanity Fair editor Frank Crowninshield served as its editor, after moving from Vanity Fair by publisher Condé Nast.
In July 1932, American Vogue placed its first color photograph on the cover of the magazine. The photograph was taken by photographer Edward Jean Steichen and portrayed a woman swimmer holding a beach ball in the air. Laird Borrelli notes that Vogue led the decline of fashion illustration in the late 1930s, when it began to replace its illustrated covers, by artists such as Dagmar Freuchen, with photographic images. Nast was responsible for introducing color printing and the "two-page spread". He has been credited with turning Vogue into a "successful business" and the "women's magazine we recognize today", having substantially increased sales volumes until his death in 1942.
In the 1950s, the decade known as the magazine's "powerful years", Jessica Daves became editor-in-chief. As Rebecca C. Tuite has noted, "Daves led a quiet charge for excellence during one of the most challenging, transformative, and rich decades in the magazine's history." Daves believed that "taste is something that can be taught and learned", and she edited Vogue as "a vehicle to educate public taste". While fashion coverage remained a priority, Daves also elevated the written content of American Vogue, particularly championing more robust arts and literature features.
The Daves era of Vogue came to an end in 1962, when Diana Vreeland joined the magazine (first as associate editor, and then, following Daves's departure in December 1962, as editor-in-chief). The pair had opposed approaches to editing Vogue, and critics said that this led the magazine to a period of "extravagance, and luxury and excess". Under Vreeland, the magazine began to appeal to the youth of the sexual revolution by focusing on contemporary fashion and editorial features that openly discussed sexuality. Vogue extended coverage to include East Village boutiques, such as Limbo on St. Mark's Place, and it included features of personalities like Andy Warhol's "Superstars". Vogue also continued making household names out of models, a practice that continued with Suzy Parker, Twiggy, Jean Shrimpton, Lauren Hutton, Veruschka, Marisa Berenson, Penelope Tree, and others.
In 1973, Vogue became a monthly publication. Under editor-in-chief Grace Mirabella, the magazine underwent extensive editorial and stylistic changes in response to changes of its target audience. Mirabella states that she was chosen to change Vogue, because "women weren't interested in reading about or buying clothes that served no purpose in their changing lives." She was selected to make the magazine appeal to "the free, working, "liberated" woman of the seventies. The magazine changed in terms of interviews, arts coverage, and articles. When this stylistic change fell out of favor in the 1980s, Mirabella was fired.
Well-known fashion photographers for the magazine include:
Erwin Blumenfeld (1897–1969)
Cecil Beaton (1904–1980)
Horst P. Horst (1906–1999)
Regina Relang (1906–1989)
Norman Parkinson (1913–1990)
Irving Penn (1917–2009)
Henry Clarke (1917–1996)
Helmut Newton (1920–2004)
Francesco Scavullo (1921–2004)
Richard Avedon (1923–2004)
Patrick Demarchelier (1943–2022)
Peter Lindbergh (1944–2019)
Stan Malinowski (1936–2024)
Herb Ritts (1952–2002)
1988–2025: Anna Wintour leadership
In July 1988, with Vogue losing readership and advertising to its rival Elle, Anna Wintour was named editor-in-chief. Noted for her trademark bob cut and sunglasses, Wintour attempted to revitalize the brand by making it feel younger and more approachable; she directed the focus towards new and accessible concepts of "fashion" for a wider audience. Wintour's influence allowed the magazine to maintain its high circulation, while staff discovered new trends that a broader audience could conceivably afford.
Throughout her reign at Vogue, Wintour accomplished her goals to revitalize the magazine and oversaw production of some of its largest editions. The September 2012 edition measured 916 pages, which was the highest ever for a monthly magazine.
The contrast of Wintour's vision with that of her predecessors was noted as striking by observers, both critics and defenders. Amanda Fortini, fashion and style contributor for Slate, argues that her policy has been beneficial for Vogue, delivering it from what some critics had termed its boring "beige years".
Among Condé Nast executives, there was worry that the grand dame of fashion publications was losing ground to Elle, which in just three years had reached a paid circulation of 851,000, compared to Vogue's 1.2 million. Thus, Condé Nast publisher Si Newhouse brought in the 38-year-old Wintour, who, through editor-in-chief positions at British Vogue and House & Garden, had become known not only for her cutting-edge visual sense, but also for her ability to radically revamp a magazine—to shake things up. Although she has had a strong impact on the magazine, Wintour has been pinned as being cold and difficult to work with. In early 2024, Vogue magazine appointed Raul Martinez as global creative editor. The appointment marks Martinez's return to Vouge from Victoria's Secret where he had previously held the row the since 2021. As the creative director, he reported to Wintour and oversees the direction for the magazine globally and its visual approach.
In June 2025 it was announced that Wintour would be stepping down from her position as editor-in-chief. She retained her roles as Chief Content Officer and Global Editorial Director at Condé Nast, while the editor-in-chief position at Vogue was replaced by the role of Head of Editorial Content. In September 2025, it was announced that Chloe Malle would succeed Wintour in this role. Malle was first listed on the masthead of the October 2025 issue, featuring Kendall Jenner and Gigi Hadid on the cover. However, the last issue that Wintour oversaw was December 2025 (featuring Timothée Chalamet on the cover) and Malle's first issue 'Spring 2026' was released in February 2026.
2025–present: Chloe Malle
In September 2025 Chloe Malle was announced as Anna Wintour's successor. It was announced that Chloe Malle would take on the title of Head of Editorial Content and Anna Wintour would take on the title of Global Editorial Director as well as Global Chief content Officer and Artist Director at Condé Nast (Vogue's parent company).
Features
Noteworthy Vogue covers
December 17, 1892: The magazine's first cover features a debutante at her début.
May 13, 1893: The first cover with a photograph, Countess Divonne (née, Florence Audenried) by an unknown photographer
July 1, 1932: The first cover with a color photograph, featuring Edward Steichen's image of a swimmer holding a beach ball.
August 15, 1933: The cover features model Toto Koopman who is both bisexual and biracial. She portrays a woman whom readers during the Great Depression would dream of being like.
November 15, 1943: 50th Anniversary cover featuring Marilyn Ambrose reading the first issue of Vogue, photo by John Rawlings
September 15, 1944: Feature 'USA Tent Hospital in France', Lee Miller as a war correspondent for Vogue.
May 1961: Sophia Loren covers the magazine and is one of the first entertainers to do so.
August 1974: Beverly Johnson becomes the first black woman to cover American Vogue.
November 1988: Anna Wintour's first cover features Israeli model Michaela Bercu.
May 1989: Under Wintour's control, Madonna became the first singer to be featured on the cover of Vogue, something that was considered "controversial," after a long-standing focus on models on their covers.
April 1992: Vogue's 100th anniversary cover featuring 10 supermodels namely Naomi Campbell, Cindy Crawford, Linda Evangelista, Christy Turlington, Tatjana Patitz, Karen Mulder, Yasmeen Ghauri, Niki Taylor, Elaine Irwin, & Claudia Schiffer, and is the highest-selling issue ever.
November 1992: Richard Gere becomes the first male to appear on the cover, alongside his then-wife Cindy Crawford.
December 1998: Hillary Clinton becomes the first American First Lady to cover the magazine.