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In 1988, fashion bible American Vogue made a major move when it named longtime fashion editor Anna Wintour its editor-in-chief. Wintour had previously served as editor-in-chief of House & Garden, another publication owned by Vogue’s parent company Condé Nast, before she was appointed editor-in-chief of American Vogue. Before House & Garden, Wintour was the editor-in-chief of British Vogue.

Wintour’s rise to the top of one of the most coveted positions in fashion journalism began with her upbringing. Her father, Charles Wintour, was editor-in-chief of the London-based Evening Standard. Journalism was in Wintour’s blood. When she was a young girl and she was asked what she wanted to be, she wrote down editor of Vogue. While her father tried to persuade her to get a formal education post-high school, she responded with, “either you know fashion or you don’t.”

In 1970, when Harper’s Bazaar UK merged with Queen to become Harper’s & Queen, Wintour began her fashion journalism career there as an editorial assistant. She would later quit and move to America to become a junior editor at Harper’s Bazaar. The magazine’s editor, Tony Mazzola, would fire her due to creative differences. Wintour would go on to become fashion editor at Viva, a women’s adult magazine founded by Kathy Keeton, the wife of Penthouse publisher Bob Guccione.

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After Viva shuttered, Wintour took time off, then became fashion editor of Savvy. The following year, she became fashion editor at New York Magazine. In 1983, she landed a position at American Vogue as creative director, a role that at the time had vaguely defined responsibilities. She often clashed with the magazine’s then editor-in-chief, Grace Mirabella.

After Beatrix Miller, the former editor-in-chief of British Vogue, retired, Wintour took over British Vogue. Now, after 35 years at the helm of American Vogue and rising to the position of parent company Condé Nast’s global chief content officer, Wintour announced she would be stepping down as editor-in-chief of Vogue, while still retaining her position as global chief content officer.

Although Wintour isn’t retiring fully, this leaves a major opening in the world of Vogue. While the title of editor-in-chief is being retired in favor of editorial director, Wintour is currently on a search for a new head honcho at American Vogue, a position that a million girls would die for. Of course, this also begs the question, what will fashion look like in a post-Anna Wintour world?

While she’s not retiring entirely, Wintour is 75 years old. She’s held an iron grip on the fashion world, particularly when it came to fashion media, for decades. Although the world of print journalism has declined since the days when magazines had so many ad pages, accounting meant nothing, Vogue still commands power and respect in the fashion world.

 Anna Wintour, actresses Lupita Nyong’o and Naomi Watts attend the Calvin Klein Collection fashion show during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Fall 2014 at Spring Studios on February 13, 2014 in New York City. (Photo by Larry Busacca/Getty Images for Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week)

Under Wintour’s tenure at Vogue, the magazine became more celebrity-focused, with Hollywood stars usually commanding the covers instead of models. Wintour has also long been considered a fashion industry power broker. Through the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund, a yearly competition which provides winners with financial support and mentoring, she’s helped build the careers of designers and brands, such as Proenza Schouler, Alexander Wang, and Joseph Altuzarra. She’s also overseen some of Vogue’s most groundbreaking covers, such as Naomi Campbell becoming the first Black woman on the September issue of the magazine, Harry Styles in a gown, and first lady Michelle Obama shortly after her husband, President Obama’s, inauguration.

Whoever Wintour is considering helming Vogue’s top spot could be anywhere between Gen-Z and Gen X, although it could be possible that she’d pick a millennial to bridge the gap between the two. Whoever ends up taking over Wintour’s job will, of course, be digitally savvy first. While Vogue still puts a strong emphasis on its covers, the focus has been more on how they perform on social media and what kind of traffic the cover stories will generate for vogue.com.

In a post-Anna Wintour world, the decline of print could happen even faster. While print ad pages still account for much of the revenue of many magazines, the shift to digital has been long and strong. With fewer people buying physical magazines, publications have shifted their advertising efforts more toward their online and social media channels. It is not uncommon to see ad tags for content on fashion publications’ social media feeds, like Instagram.

The old guard at Vogue might also leave with Wintour, making room for new blood. Grace, Coddington, Phyllis Posnick, and Tonne Goodman have been with Wintour at Vogue for decades. Goodman was formerly the fashion director, but is now the sustainability editor, and Posnick and Coddington are now contributing editors, having formerly been Executive Editor and Creative Director. While the trio no longer holds the higher titles they once had, they have still been responsible for much of the imagery and designers featured in Vogue. A new editorial director will likely want their own team of top talent, ushering in a potentially entire new era at Vogue.

As influencers from Instagram and TikTok are also seeking credibility from legacy media, it’s possible that the future of fashion after Anna Wintour could also involve even more social media influencers. While Wintour was bold in putting celebrities on the covers, could the future Vogue editorial director be more open to featuring a social media influencer on the cover? 

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In addition to what the future of Vogue will look like, there is also the lingering question of what will happen to the Met Gala. While it will likely still be Wintour’s baby as she’s still staying on as Chief Content Officer at Condé Nast, the new editorial director of Vogue will be her heir apparent and will become the new face of the event. Wintour held strict rules in place for the event, from the celebrities not being allowed to have their publicists with them to allowing no press inside.

Could her future heir be laxer about these protocols, particularly even where the press is concerned? Editors outside of Condé Nast were once granted access to the event back in the day, but that practice stopped as it became very much a Vogue-centric event where Wintour reminded everyone of the power and gravitas she held in fashion. The younger generations grew up with a much less gatekept attitude about fashion, and while the Met Gala will never be a public-facing event, the mystery of what happens behind the Met Museum doors could slightly evaporate.

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While fashion can still be exclusionary and cutthroat, gone are the days of the ‘80s and ‘90s elitism that so dominated the industry. A post-Anna Wintour world means an even heavier social media-obsessed fashion industry, fashion becoming even more democratized, and a future where print has declined. The world of fashion media will transform post-Anna Wintour. But from the ashes do phoenixes rise.

Kristopher Fraser