On the Podcast: The Making of Chioma Nnadi’s First September Issue (Featuring Kylie Jenner)

Planting a flag for fall fashion, Vogue’s September issue is always a big deal. On this episode of The Run-Through, we pull back the curtain to show how a September issue is made—and not just any old September issue, but Chioma Nnadi’s very first as British Vogue’s head of editorial content.

Chioma’s cover star is Kylie Jenner, and in the episode you’ll hear Kylie muse about why this issue is so important to her. You’ll also hear from many of the key players who worked behind the scenes, like photographer Luis Alberto Rodriguez, who shot Kylie in Los Angeles (at Sophia Loren’s former estate—how chic!), and stylist Ib Kamara, who explains how he created Kylie’s sartorial mood.

Laura Ingham, deputy director of Vogue’s Global Fashion Network, offers some fascinating background on the work that goes into arranging a cover shoot. “I would say that for this, we probably had around 90 pages of looks that we called for the story,” Ingham says. She goes on to compare the Kylie shoot to others she’s worked on in the past, and—no surprise—different stylists work in different ways. Here’s how Laura describes working with Grace Coddington, for instance:

“I’ve worked with Grace Coddington on big September stories before, and she’s someone who is sort of captivating when it comes to process and image-making and what goes into each and every picture. I couldn’t believe it when I saw her storyboard a shoot the first time I worked with her at British Vogue. It was like nothing I’d ever seen before. Talking about the number of looks that you have on set, you know, we talked about there being around 90, potentially, for this story … and I think when I’ve worked with Grace on a big September or big collection story, she’ll give an edit of no more than 18 looks. And those 18 looks are the only 18 that she’ll shoot. So from a fashion perspective, it means that we have to work with the brands to ensure that those looks are released for the shoot. We get them to location because she’s uncompromising in her creativity and that uncompromising creativity, I think, has informed so much of what I’ve worked on following working with her for the first time. It counts for a lot, I think.”