When Lisa Lovatt-Smith started out at British Vogue, she was little more than a tea-fetching intern. But by sticking with Anna Wintour during the nascent stages of her leadership at the magazine, Lovatt-Smith went on to become a prominent part of the masthead.
"Anna Wintour came along, and of course a lot of people left the magazine," she told HuffPost Live in a Friday interview. "She wanted a completely different look to it, and so one day there weren't that many people left, and I think she decided to promote me."
Wintour had come to run the glossy by way of New York, bringing to it a new kind of "aura" and energy.
"British Vogue went from being this rather genteel place where people went to work for a couple of years before they got married to somebody with a big house in the country to actually being somewhere where you could do cutting edge work and have a career," Lovatt-Smith recalled.
This new era for British Vogue meant that Lovatt-Smith, an international editor for the magazine, was afforded actual editorial responsibility, a rarity at the time, and something she credits to Wintour.
"I did get a feeling that I was working with someone very special and that it was a very particular moment in the zeitgeist and that I was a part of that, and that was amazing actually," the OAfrica organization founder said. "An incredible opportunity. Really a case of being at the right place at the right time."
Sign up here for Live Today, HuffPost Live’s morning email that will let you know the newsmakers, celebrities and politicians joining us that day and give you the best clips from the day before!
Related
Before You Go
