Fall’s Fashion Bible

Combine fashion and reading and you have the best of all worlds.

In high school, voracious reader that I was, it didn’t take long for me to add magazines and all they offered to the printed material line-up. There were all the usual suspects:

Seventeen, October 2016

Mademoiselle, November 2001

YM, December 2004/January 2005

And then I discovered Vogue.

Specifically, the September issue.

And my world has never been quite the same.

September is the month when fashion magazines across the globe celebrate our fascination with haute couture by publishing unusually large issues, and Vogue is the granddaddy of the bunch. This year, Kendall Jenner fronts the 800 pages of Vogue’s September volume.

Yes, you read that correctly, 800 pages.

In celebration of their 120 birthday in 2012, their September edition contained a whopping 916 pages, its largest, to date.

It’s affectionately referred to as The Fashion Bible, a nod to its size, and the industry’s reliance on it as the definitive authority for the upcoming season. The gold standard.

For me, this has become tradition, ritual, if you will. Vogue’s September issue, coffee, and an empty pre-fall afternoon. It is escapism at its best during the lazy days of a quickly fading summer. I immerse myself in a world I will never move around in, wouldn’t want to, but find so incredibly fascinating. A book of fairy tales for adults. It keeps the imagination alive, working, dreaming, creating.

As you would expect, this issue is packed with advertising campaigns from all the movers and shakers at the premiere fashion houses around the world. They’re laying claim to the upcoming season, making their marks and trying to carve out their unique place in an overly competitive business.

It also has interesting articles (I highly recommend the interview with Kendall Jenner), and fashion related information and content, but let’s be honest, it’s a bit like someone saying they read Playboy for the articles. The reason you get it and devote a couple of hours to its study, is to look at the photographs.

And they are gorgeous.

It’s a pretty book, full of pretty people, and pretty clothes. I love looking at it for the same reason I enjoy art, it’s beautiful, interesting, and creatively inspiring.

Take a break from your responsibilities. Lose yourself in something that relaxes and refuels you, because ultimately, that’s what we’re talking about: Indulging in the glamour of one of the world’s most celebrated publications as a way to remove yourself from the duties and demands we face everyday. Something we all need to do more often.

Read. Daydream. Enjoy.

From the comfort of your own home. Duck pajamas, bunny slippers, hair in a ponytail and all.

How do you relax and indulge in ‘me’ time? Let me know in the comments.

It’s not too late! You can still grab a copy of Vogue here, at Amazon, and it will ship in a special keepsake box.