Breaking News: Anna Wintour is Powerful

It's a bit of a cliche -- but it's also true -- that the fashion industry is notorious for copying itself. Season after season, designers look to the past to help inspire their future endeavors. So why should fashion news coverage be expected to do otherwise? Frankly, it shouldn't and it doesn't.

Take for example Anna Wintour. Are there any more words that could be written about the polarizing editor in chief of Vogue? Is there anyone who is remotely interested in fashion who doesn't know about the despot of clothing? Strangely enough, the Wall Street Journal just might think so, and thus devoted a lengthy article to the subject of Ms. Wintour and her overarching power that influences an entire multi-billion dollar industry. It seems a strange time to feature her -- she's not promoting a documentary or anything -- and it certainly doesn't cover any new ground (it's hard to beat the Cathy Horyn-penned profile from a few years ago), but we here at OUT are obsessed with Wintour and had to read the story.

"Brand Anna" written by Joshua Levine explores not only Wintour's power within the fashion industry -- confirming she helms Conde Nast's most lucrative title -- but also her how her sphere of power affects the worlds of entertainment (including her popularizing the celebrity face covering a fashion magazine which seems expected now), politics, business (saying that her implementation of Fashion's Night Out was akin to "creating a holiday") and sports (she loves Tennis and often includes sport's heavyweights in issues). Everyone from Marc Jacobs to Hollywood titan Harvey Weinstein come out to laud her with compliments. And while another article exploring her cultural potency is still fascinating, there seems to be a lack of concern towards the whole endeavor. Where is the fear or homogenization that one point of view can foster? Where is the critical analysis of the detriments of such a totalitarian dictatorship? None here. Even moments that hint of critique are quickly erased by effusive celebrity quotes.

But the most exciting part of the piece is that Levine had time to sit with the editor herself and allow her to weigh in on the subject of her icy persona. In those moments of interaction, Wintour seems charming and self-aware, affable and humorous. It's an interesting and rare side that is not often exposed. After all, one doesn't become the ruler of an empire without a little bit of magnetic allure, do they?

Picture courtesy of Ivan Shaw/ Wall Street Journal