WHEN OUR COVER STAR ROSEMARY FERGUSON appeared on the Miu Miu runway during Paris Fashion Week, my peers and I took notice. Here was a woman who inhabited Miuccia Prada’s subversive sportswear with a cool sense of confidence – a real grown-up. This happened during a week in which Pamela Anderson (unbelievably) made headlines for daring to attend the shows with a bare face, revealing the natural contours of her 56-year-old skin in all its glory. How bizarre that the mere notion of a woman allowing herself to age in the public eye is breaking news in the year that is 2023. As a woman in her forties, I have little patience for it.
A woman over 40 on a runway, or in her fifties going make-up free, shouldn’t be groundbreaking. And yet, here we all are, talking about it.
At ELLE, we’ve always sought to show the full spectrum of womanhood across age, race, size and more. And as we head into 2024, we’re deepening our commitment to this. As we’ve always said on the team, ‘ELLE is a state of mind, rather than an age’.
The state of mind has been a talking point for us as we send this issue to press – not just in terms of how we see ourselves in the world, but how we see a society that feels increasingly fraught.
How do we turn fear and grief into love and hope? 2023 has given us plenty to be anxious about, with its labour strikes, wars and worrying weather.
Our work and social lives have returned at full steam, yet many of us feel lonelier than ever. We navigate the banal routines of our day-to-day – commuting, working, playing, dating and, for some, parenting – while still grappling with very real, existential questions that confront us on a constant social-media loop. The balance seems fragile.
When the team and I first began planning this issue, we envisioned a celebration of sorts; an ELLE party coming to life on the pages. But world events took a turn and it felt more appropriate to look at ways we can protect and nurture our personal happiness and imagination.
For some, that might mean escapism in the traditional sense: losing yourself in the Indian Ocean as fashion editor Eni Subair did in her article on page 18
