FINALLY! Some gumption from the most BORING magazine to roam the earth. Finally some show of backbone and smarts. Its been a long time coming. Its no secret, I don’t much care for Vogue, especially Vogue UK, I think its the most lacklustre magazine, its boring, patronising and shamefully un-diverse. You just have to look at its track record for putting women of colour, or any other ethnicity on its cover to understand this point. For years it has prided itself on one formulae; stick a skinny, white girl on the cover, throw in a few words like “chic” “trendy”, find a billion and one ways to recycle drivel about weight, age and sex and label them issues for women to chomp on. Okay.
However, for its April 2014 issue, the magazine has finally decided to do something different and that in itself is a cause for applause.
Nigella Lawson graces the cover of the April issue and what an appealing sight she is. Of course it’ll be a rehash of what we have watched on TV and read in countless tabloids, only in fancier Vogue-esque words and phrases. “Fresh Start” so boldly written on the cover is a dead give away, but I’ll take it. Heck I’ll take a shoe on the cover than another “starlet” and recycled fridge magnet interviews.
Nigella is sporting the no make-up, make-up look, although Vogue would have us believe that the normally, finely vamped up Lawson who is always photographed looking nothing short of stunning, only has on a little blusher and mascara. Sure. Whatever. In the interview Lawson confesses to her insecurities, something we hardly see looking from the outside in…
“I was terrified of being of being photographed without make-up, and I hate having my looks talked up. It always makes me feel I’m going to be a disappointment in the flesh”
She looks beautiful, if a little stoic, but Nigella Lawson is a painfully beautiful woman. She is sexy, relatable, which I suppose is what Vogue is banking on by making her look like the woman next door, and for whatever has been said about her in the media these past few months, she is inspiring. She works hard. I am so, #TEAMNIGELLAFUCKCHARLESSAATCHI
I’ll buy this Vogue, I may not read it, but I’ll definitely buy it if only to remind myself that for every woman on the cover, who looks nothing like the average women they pander to, this is one of the few times Vogue got it right.
Photograph by Nathaniel Goldberg. Hair- Luke Hersherson for Daniel Hersherson. Make-Up- Sally Branka. Image Source- Vogue.co.uk