5/19/2008

Vogue India so far

Sorry for the break. I've got a few e-mails asking me what might have happened to me. There's only one answer - the springtime. Sorry once more.

OK, so I'm late to write about the recent resort collections - probably everything was already said about that and nothing new would I add to the issue. As in the last couple of weeks I'm sort of forced to gain knowledge about Bollywood, I decided to take a closer look at Vogue India, which was launched in October 2007. Here's the first cover, as we all remember, with Gemma Ward, two Indian models: Monikangana Dutta and Lakshmi Menon and three Bollywood superstars: Bipasha Basu, Priyanka Chopra and Preity Zinta.



Both the issue and the cover became controversial. The issue - because it was thought that it is not "vogue" enough and too "Indian" (which sounds kind of weird knowing that it's an Indian magazine, but I get the point). The cover - because it looks too much like the premier Vogue China cover and besides it's just... bad. Judging from what girls at Fashionspot say and from some scans of eds you can find at Flickr, Vogue India is getting better and better with every issue (but not with its the covers - unfortunately). And it stays so Indian - contrary to for example Vogue Nippon that is not as Japanese as we could expect.




  1. November: Deepika Padukone, model and Bollywood actress
  2. December: random models
  3. January: (in the red dress) Gauri Khan, Bollywood movie producer and director
  4. February: Katrina Kaif, Bollywood actress
  5. March: Kareena Kapoor, Bollywood actress
  6. April: Lakshmi Menon, model
  7. May: Bipasha Basu, Bollywood actress
Too much of Bollywood in a fashion magazine, don't you think? Furthermore, in May there was a men's edition launched - Vogue India Man. And on the cover - the famous Krrish guy with 11 fingers. Sounds like a perfect choice - according to Polish wikipedia Hrithik is as popular among men (he started out in India the trend of one-day beard) as he is among women (30 000 Valentine's cards in February 2000 only). But I hope to see somebody outside Bollywood on the June cover.


And here are some snaps from random eds:

Source: FashionSpot

6 comments:

  1. Too Indian? What does that mean? It's Indian Vogue! Oh, I know...I know...lets make it more...I know..."White"?

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  2. Um...excuse me??? "Too much Bollywood" on Vogue covers??? Oh okay, because Wintour never uses Hollywood on her covers.
    Oh yeah...that's right, she uses nothing but.
    A very ignorant statement.

    The controversy had to do with having a white girl on the cover. Now, Gemma Ward is from my country so nothing against her but she was not needed on this cover. The controversial aspect was "what? Vogue India needs white skin for credibility?" Give me a break.

    Going by your logic, Vogue US is too white.

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  3. Indians rock

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  4. How can it be too Indian if it is an Indian magazine? or too Bollywood? Bollywood stars are gorgeous & have great fashion sense

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  5. I see I haven't answered... What I meant is not that Vogue India should have more white models, I think it should have more Indian models! The same was Vogue US should have more American models and NOT Hollywood celebrities.

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  6. oh, and I don't agree with the statement that it's too Indian - that's what the apostrophes are for.

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