The Vogue Factor: The Inside Story of Fashion's Most Illustrious Magazine (13 page)

Robyn had been the beauty editor of
Vogue
, the editor of
Vogue Living
and for the past few years, the managing director of Yves Saint Laurent Beauté. Chic, funny and smart, she was also one of Nancy’s best friends. I offered her a glass of champagne and as we were chatting she said quietly: “How would you like to be the editor of
Vogue
?”

I’m not entirely sure, but I probably spluttered in amazement. Robyn then confessed that she had just accepted the role as managing director of Condé Nast. I was to keep it confidential but she felt I was the right person to replace Juliet. She asked me to prepare a document outlining my vision and what I thought I could bring to the magazine, and we agreed to meet again in a few days to discuss the role.

Not once, in what had been my fourteen years in publishing, had I considered editing
Vogue
. I had never thought about what came next or coveted someone else’s job. I had no desire in particular to be on top. I loved what I did, and was always happy in the positions that I had held. Certainly, throughout the years, I have witnessed a number of people enter the business with teeth-gnashing career ambition, but that type of person unnerves me. I have generally found that the very ambitious make terrible decisions, because everything is about them. When Robyn offered me the role I did not in all honesty think: “Yes, yes, at last, finally the job I deserve, editor of
Vogue
!” I was not interested in the status; I never have been. I just liked making magazines.

I went home and thought, “I think I could do it. I’ve worked in every part of the business. I know good staff when I see them.” From my long experience I knew that making
Vogue
a success was, ultimately, not going to be about me and how marvellous and clever I was. It would depend entirely on the team we put together. From reception upwards.

There was more good news. In a wonderfully ironic twist, Nancy Pilcher was going back to
Vogue
in a senior editorial position that covered Condé Nast’s interests in both Australia and Asia Pacific. She was going to be installed in Guérin’s now vacated office. The former workspace of the same man who had unceremoniously fired her two years before. Nancy moved in and promptly painted the wall behind her an Hermès shade of orange. The color of intelligence.

Rumors were flying around the marketplace that Ashworth was about to be replaced, and the most persistent conjecture was that the editorship of
Vogue
would be given to Karin. No one suspected that I had the gig, and it was agonizing trying to keep it secret. I can’t be sure, but I think someone at ACP began to have their suspicions.

Karin was due back from New York imminently, and I suddenly received an out of the blue offer from
Harper’s Bazaar
management. The idea was that I would become editor of
Bazaar
, as Karin was going to be promoted to editorial director of both
Bazaar
and
Belle
magazines.

I was feeling slightly overwhelmed at this point with two offers on the table, but in my heart I was committed to
Vogue
. I needed to stall. I didn’t want to accept the position at
Bazaar
and then go back on my word. Yet if I declined, they would sense something was up. It was a matter of mere days before Juliet was to be informed her services were no longer required at
Vogue
. As soon as that happened, Robyn was going to ring me in the
Bazaar
office and I would then immediately hand in my notice. I disliked feeling so underhanded, but legally this is how things have to play out. I had not planned or executed any ideas that I intended to take to
Vogue
, or approached any staff. It was an honor to be offered the editorship of
Bazaar
and I was grateful for my time there, but the idea of rebuilding
Vogue
was too enticing.

It was amazing to me that with no real preconceived notion of where I was heading, I should be offered the editorship of Australia’s top two luxury titles simultaneously. But I would never have considered returning to
Vogue
if I did not believe in the new management. The best masthead in the world means nothing without the right people in charge. I believed in the power of
Vogue
. But I also knew things were not handed to you on a platter. When you edit
Vogue
, you are under a microscope. You had to be smarter and faster than the competition, and I wanted to accept that challenge.

L
ooking back at my performance in sewing classes at Sylvania Heights Primary School, it seems ludicrous that I would end up working in the fashion industry. I’m surprised I wasn’t put off fashion for life by my teacher Mrs. Smith. A spiteful, dour woman who always had pins between her pursed lips, Mrs. Smith delighted in skewering those students who weren’t quite up to par with their needlework.

One afternoon, as I was hunched over a stupid pinwheel trying to embroider a chain stitch, she turned on me and demanded I do it all over again because it wasn’t straight. I made the mistake of admitting that I hated the whole exercise and I didn’t envisage a future that included embroidery anyway. This made her so angry she kept the whole class back after the bell rang until I completed the task. All the girls were hissing “C’mon Clements” and throwing things at me, as my tears plopped down on the pinwheel and Mrs. Smith stood over me with a malevolent grin. I distinctly remember having a Scarlett O’Hara “as God is my witness I will never pick up a sewing needle again” moment, and went straight home to tell my mother about my humiliation. My dear mum immediately wrote a letter to the school,
reminding them of my academic prowess (Year Four spelling bee champion) and demanded that I be excused from sewing classes. I also made her put in a paragraph stating that a girls-only sewing class was sexist. It may have been the headmaster’s little joke, but as a result I was sent to woodshop lessons with the boys. That too was tedious, irrelevant and possibly cancerous, because the tough guys in the class were constantly setting fire to whatever useless knick-knack they made, but I stayed just to prove a point. Eventually the teachers allowed me to go to the library, where I read and wrote ghost stories instead.

As luck would have it, sewing was compulsory in my first year of high school. There was just something about sewing machines and me. It was as if I attracted a poltergeist every time I went near one. By the time I had clumsily threaded the needle and then jammed and unjammed the bloody thing ten or so times, the rest of the class would have run up a wraparound maxi skirt while my fabric would be in shreds. My high school teacher eventually took pity on me and just let me watch the other girls. To this day I have never so much as sewn on a button and I never will.

There was a very strict dress code at my high school that none of us dared to stray from, mostly revolving around high-waisted shorts with front pleats in Hawaiian-print cotton. I had to pay friends who could sew to make some for me. The shorts were accessorised with “slaps” (velvet thongs with a rattan base that smelled like a wet dog after one wear), clunkies (a wooden platform wedge sandal), or a platform Dr. Scholl’s sandal. I desperately wanted a pair of Scholl’s, but my mother, who owned an upmarket children’s clothing boutique called Minnie’s Inn Shop, refused to buy me any. She had noticed all the surfie (Australian slang for someone who surfs all the time) chicks shuffling down the street in them, and had apparently been revolted by their dry cracked heels.

My girlfriends and I also shopped in the hippie stores, for long Indian-print wraparound skirts (perfect with aforementioned clunkies), stacks of thin, multicolored and patterned plastic bracelets, and strawberry musk oil. Jeans were flared and high waisted, worn with boob tubes or a satin handkerchief top. Bikinis were crochet. Eye shadow was bright sky-blue.

When I think back, my local shopping mall perhaps shaped my future more than I could ever have predicted. There was a newsagency at the front of the center that imported a UK magazine for teenage girls called
Pink
. I was obsessed with it.
Pink
covered fashion, beauty, pop bands, the tone was clever and fun, and I was completely addicted. Whoever edited it was a genius. The news-agency only ordered one or two copies, so every Saturday morning I would walk nearly two miles to the mall and sit outside by myself, often in the cold, waiting for it to open so I wouldn’t miss out. That I ended up being the beauty editor of
Vogue
now makes such perfect sense.

By the age of fifteen, my girlfriends and I had started going to local pubs and discos, dressed to kill (and get past the doorman) in harem pants, lip gloss, stiletto mules and clutch bags. But I hated the music. I had always liked glam rock: the first single I ever bought was “Jeepster” by T. Rex, I’d seen Bryan Ferry and Gary Glitter, I was a member of the David Bowie fan club and I made my own Bowie scrapbooks. The longer I lived in my town, the less I fit in. I couldn’t stand the beach culture, and all the abuse that would be hurled at you when you walked past a gang of surfies. Everyone was stoned all the time, listening to The Doobie Brothers or the Eagles. Nobody wanted to go to university, travel or even read. The mere sound of rugby league commentary on the radio on Sunday afternoons depressed me and reminded me how out of place I was.

In 1978 I began working at a shoe store for a few afternoons a week after school and on Saturday mornings. It was also a ballet supply store. I absolutely loved that job; unpacking all the new shoes when they came in, and just being surrounded by the gorgeous pale-pink satin-pointe slippers and headbands.

The owner’s daughter, Leonie, was a year or so older than me, and had a boyfriend with a car and great taste in music. One morning, when we were both working together in the store, she told me that she and her boyfriend were going into the city to see a band. Would I like to come? Saturday night, I was sixteen years old and we were headed for the Grand Hotel in the heart of Sydney.

The front of the bar was your average rough Aussie pub, with a ragtag bunch of drinkers of all ages. You had to walk through to the back and down a few steps to a windowless room that had another small bar. This is where the bands played. No one checked ID. I walked into the gloom nervously and looked around. It was full of punks with safety pins in their noses and ears, studded leather jackets and skinny black jeans. There were hardly any girls, and the ones that were there looked formidable. The support band started, a sort of punkish/rockabilly outfit called Tommy and the Dipsticks. Then came the more hardcore punk band: Johnny Dole and the Scabs. The crowd was drinking and spitting and pogoing. It was the most exciting thing I had ever seen. The music, the energy, the clothes. I had discovered like-minded people from all backgrounds; people who loved music, film and fashion. That night changed my life.

After my epiphany at the Grand, I became obsessed with the punk scene. Luckily, I could stay at my Aunt Fay’s house, which was central to all the venues, and she didn’t care what time I came home. She would also let my best friends from school, Robyn and Jenny, stay. That was the end of the horrible disco clothes.

Our new uniform consisted of black or blue jeans that we had to have taken in by Jenny (who could manage a sewing machine) to make them into super-skinny stovepipes. We wore black sneakers, T-shirts and khaki army disposal jackets with red lipstick, black nail polish and loads of eyeliner. We made friends with a lot of the guys in the bands, who were really very sweet when they weren’t spitting and pogoing. All the pubs had live music, and no one cared if you were underage. There were never any problems. We were there for the music and the fashion, not to smash glasses.

Once I fell into the band scene there was no going back to my old neighborhood. My mother knew I had a thirst for adventure, and she trusted me. Mum had traveled a great deal as a young woman, taking the ship to London and having numerous European adventures before she met my father Joseph. She always encouraged me to follow my instincts. So a few months later I had the clerical job at a stockbroker’s office, and had moved into my first apartment in Kings Cross, which I shared with a girlfriend. I had escaped from the stifling conformity of the suburbs! Now the fashion experimentation really kicked in.

Everybody in the punk music scene had no money to speak of, as they were all in bands and on the dole. Over the next few years I would live in shared accommodation in many dubious terrace houses and apartments, listening to Iggy Pop and the Buzzcocks while various aspiring bass players practiced the opening riff to “Public Image” in the living room. The girls, rather than the boys, tended to have jobs, as for some of us it was important to have milk, tea and toilet paper in the house. Because we were all broke, clothes were trawled from thrift stores and customized to suit. Everyone looked amazing. We became terrible image snobs. I suppose in some way I had merely swapped the uniform of the suburbs for another tribal code—but this one was far more cool.

The boys were all super skinny because they lived on cigarettes and wine, and only ate the day their dole checks came in. They all had whippet-thin black suits, with dyed black hair
à la
Bob Dylan in his heroin period, or were bleached blonde in leather jackets like Paul Simonon from The Clash. We had very specific groups we would cross over with: rockabillies, punks, mods, New Romantics and weird, arty New Zealanders in vintage clothes, yes; hippies, long-haired pub rock kids and surfies—good God no.

My girlfriends and I adopted another look that was based around black miniskirts, fishnet stockings, ripped sweatshirts, hoop earrings and bleached blonde hair, later dyed bright pink. On one trip to visit Mum she refused to walk through the local shopping center with me. I think I was also wearing white, short gumboots with matte black tights—probably not my sartorial zenith. Then a boy I was mad about told me I looked like a fifties B-grade movie star. I was thrilled with this (now I come to think of it) somewhat backhanded compliment. My new fashion predilection was for full fifties skirts, angora sweaters, stiletto heels and diamante drop earrings. The thrift shops were a treasure trove, because at that time they were full of fifties and sixties originals that didn’t cost the earth. My fashion icon was Ava Gardner, and the mother, Nancy Kelly, from the 1956 horror thriller movie
The Bad Seed
. The forties and the fifties have always been my preferred style decades, and in later years I would shop at Prada to achieve a similar effect.