COVERY STORY | AUGUST 2013 | GRACE CODDINGTON

Some of you might not know her name or even her face for that matter, but it's her name and face that have created some of the most beautiful, iconic, romantic, stylish, and inspirational stories and photographs to grace the pages of the Vogue franchise, ever. 

She started simple: reading British Vogue in the 1960s as a teenager and rushing to the shops to pick up her copy that she ordered once a month. She, like many before her and certainly many after her, was inspired by what she saw and read, she loved the 'chic' idea that was going on, this fantasy world inside the pages being created by its fashion gods which also was a massive world away from the lifestyle she leads and grew up in, in North Wales. Upon gazing at the pictures she would find an advert for a Vogue modeling competition (someone sent in her competition photographs) and the rest, as they say, is history. Coddington won the young section of the competition, packed up her stuff, and moved to London to become a successful full-time model for the magazine alongside such stars as Angelica Houston. But life being what it is she had to leave modeling behind due to an unfortunate bad car accident she was a victim of. But the fashion world wasn't going to let this talent slip through its fingers, Grace went on to become a junior fashion editor for British Vogue and like a trooper she worked her way up to become a fashion editor, before moving onto the big apple, New York City and American Vogue, ironically starting on the exact same day as current editor in chief herself Anna Wintour.

“I never dreamt of being a model and I never ever dreamt of being a fashion editor, I just loved the pages and the pictures. In my early years as a fashion editor, I worked with Norman Parkinson who was a really big photographer, and he taught me to always keep my eyes open, never go to sleep in, and keep watching because whatever you see out the window or wherever it can inspire you”.

Watching The September Issue really opened my eyes to the editor's work. The way in which she captures the sheer beauty, a real story, and a theme behind the thing that we all love and that we all have in common, fashion, is just sheer brilliance. She goes beyond the fashion, the trends, the idea that clothes are just thrown together to be photographed and publicized for their creators and tells a story through a fantasy, kind of like what she grew up reading in British Vogue as a teenager. She's covered all the fantasy stories you can think of too, Hansel and Gretel, The Wizard of Oz even down to Alice In Wonderland proving that there is no living stylist other than herself that can capture not just a story, or even just a trend for that matter, but your imagination, through the imagination and passion of bringing to life a fantasy through style, through clothes, and through fashion.

What do you think of Grace's work as a model, a stylist, and an editor? Leave us a comment or tweet us: @TREND__FASHION and tell me what you love about Grace Coddington.