“It is with great sadness we announce the passing of Andre Leon Talley on January 18th 2022” – Mr Talley IG account

The larger than life fashion legend died in a New York hospital after suffering an apparent heart attack.

Talley is remembered as a driving force in Vogue’s success, serving as the magazine’s long-acclaimed creative director and American editor-at-large through the 1980s and ’90s.

His death comes just three years after his decades-long friendship with Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour ended when she froze him out for being ‘too old, too overweight, too uncool’. 

Talley claimed, in a memoir released in 2020, that he was left with ‘huge emotional and psychological scars’ from his friendship with the notoriously icy editor. 

However, he also credited her, along with Diana Vreeland and Andy Warhol, with shaping his career.

‘I will not criticize her,’ he said in a May 2020 interview with Vulture. ‘My book is an epistle to everyone that I love. It’s a love letter to Anna Wintour. I love her deeply.’   

Thank you Mr Talley for opening doors that were once shut for people of colour!