What it’s really like to work at ‘Vogue Australia’

0:26Thank you. and what's next for them. It's all in the name of great drinks and even better conversations. This series is made possible by Dan Murphy's, the ultimate tastemaker bringing us the next generation of delicious low-alcohol and non-alcoholic drinks. Head in-store or to the app to be inspired and find your new favourite. And remember to choose to drink wise.

0:57Hello, I am Madison Sullivan Thorpe, Stylish's Wednesday and Friday co-host. Welcome to another episode of Face to Face. Today, I am so excited to be joined by Gladys Lai. Gladys, let me introduce you. Now, I don't know if this is just a running theme on our Face to Face series, but every time I read someone's CV, I just feel like their bio makes me think we don't have the same 24 hours and you are no exception to this rule. In fact, you might be going straight to the top of this pyramid. But Gladys, you are an editor, brand strategist, presenter and journalist. You're currently head of brand for Vogue Australia.

1:35I mean, I wish you could go and tell like five year old you that should be tickled pink. You studied arts and law at university before making the transition into fashion journalism in 2019. With over six years of experience in luxury digital and print publishing, you have a wealth of knowledge about the fashion industry, brand building, content strategy, and contemporary media landscape. Your writing examines style through the lens of politics, culture, and aesthetic theory. Your work has featured in, I don't want to miss any of these, US Vogue, British Vogue, GQ, Vogue Scandinavia, and many more.

2:11Gladys, hi. Hi. We're very excited. Oh my gosh. That's a very impressive bio. Thank you so much. It's just work. I think it's a bit more than work, given that we have an audience that has probably grown up scanning the pages of Vogue and pining and adoring. I mean, what a title that you hold now. Oh gosh. I mean, it's, I feel like the title that I hold now and the work that I do, I very often desensitize to it. I think I'll come back home from a long day at work and probably after today and just complain about how long the day was. And then they'll ask me to break it down and I'll be like, oh, you know, went to this shoot, did this interview, did this.

2:53So sometimes I feel like a brat, but I am very grateful for it at the end of the day. Well, last year was like the summer of brats. So let's just continue it on into 2026. Gladys, we love a recommendation here at Stylish. And on our Wednesday episodes, we religiously do a segment called The Swap. So we thought it would be really fun to kick off the interview by asking if you have a swap to share with our audience. Oh, gosh, I feel like because you talked about skincare, now the only thing I can think about is my very sparse skincare routine. But it's very affordable. I really do not splurge on skincare at all.

3:33It consists of maybe three products every night and most of it is Paula's Choice. But I swear by Paula's Choice BHA liquid. I think it's maybe 20 bucks around that number. But it's great. It's an exfoliant. You know what's going to happen now? It's going to be sold out for the next three months because everyone's going to listen to this. Hopefully they listen to this and go out and buy it. So sorry, Sephora and Paula's Choice. I think the stock is going to be cleared. Yeah, you're welcome. You can sponsor me if you want. Send me a lifetime supply. Yeah, there you go. Gladys, let's get into it now that we know your secret to perfect skin.

4:11I feel like we have to give the context that off mic, I was like, girl, drop the skincare routine. Your skin is impeccable. But enough about your skin and let's get into this very impressive bio. You studied art history initially and wanted to initially be an art curator. How has your background in the arts informed your approach to fashion writing? Oh gosh, immensely. I'll preface by saying that I never expected to end up in fashion. I always had a dream of being an academic or a museum curator and living in the archives. And when I started out in the workplace, that was where I was. I was cataloging things.

4:53I was writing up those small descriptions that you see beside artworks in the gallery. and you know sometimes I was dealing with luxury goods but that was the closest to fashion that I ever got and when I was in university I took this one elective course in fashion history and fashion analysis and it was I believe it was the first year it was offered at the University of Sydney shout out to Professor Mark DeVitas who was amazing and was my thesis supervisor as well I love him. He's the best person in the whole world. And he really introduced me to how incredibly interesting and analytical fashion study could be.

5:37and I saw that so much of what I was studying in art history overlapped with what fashion demanded which was a great deal of sociology, visual theory, anthropology, psychology, economics and fashion was at the nexus of that and so in my job now I'm very lucky to be able to bring all of that experience together and I always think that coming to fashion from a non-fashion background but having a keen interest in visual culture, visual politics, it makes the world of fashion so much more interesting and so much more about more than the clothes I suppose. That is just the most beautiful way to speak about fashion.

6:22I think that we need to play that clip whenever someone's like oh you work in fashion and think it's like vapid and vain. Yeah I can give the cerulean monologue from Devil Wears Prada which is the more concise version of that. Oh, don't you worry. We're definitely going to be talking devil wears powder as well. But you also studied law. I mean, talk about being an academic, but what made you want to end up in fashion after studying art history, studying law? How did you kind of get to fashion? Yeah, I always wanted to do something creative. So in my final year of school, I very infamously took no STEM subjects at a school where everyone was doing STEM subjects and I loved the humanities.

7:02When I signed on to do law, I will be honest, I had no intention of ever becoming a lawyer, which I think was much to the chagrin of my classmates who were very vocational and very doggedly pursuing a career in law. I was very interested in law from a theoretical standpoint. So I loved all of the classes that my fellow classmates hated. Equity, all of the really abstract lectures about airy fairy law, so not contracts or torts or anything tangible. I think that what made the study of law so invaluable for me was it taught me a certain kind of rigor to apply to my research and everything that I do everything that I write has to have a certain logic and if it doesn't test up to you know maybe I'm like stress testing a certain thesis or I'm stress testing an argument and I'm reading the flow of an argument from beginning to end it doesn't matter if it's an opinion piece or a long-form essay it needs to have that persuasiveness and that's what I found really valuable about studying at uni.

8:24Yeah fantastic I love that insight too because I think a lot of the time people study something and the natural progression and trajectory is that you end up working in that field but there's so much to gain from particular degrees or ways of thinking that are such a colourful array of informing the rest of your life or the industry you do end up working in and I think law and arts are probably two perfect examples of those degrees. A hundred percent. I am a believer in meandering. I don't think that setting yourself, you know, a one-way ticket on a train to whatever career you want is necessarily the most interesting way to live life.

9:02I mean, people definitely do that and I very much respect it. But I think that when you shut yourself off to different disciplines and different modes of thinking, you shut yourself off to different ways of seeing the discipline that you do want to end up in and I think there's often a very hard line drawn between practical and quote-unquote abstract careers I think that reciprocity between creativity and more rigid analysis is exactly what makes fashion so interesting for me now yeah I also think we just need to bring back the word meandering in a positive light. I love that. I'm going to start calling myself a professional meanderer.

9:45I think you should meander. The silent moments in life is what life is all about. Yeah, and less one-way tickets and more like around the world. A hundred percent. Now, Gladys, historically, I was not a big believer in fate. That has changed in recent times. And look, we always do a little bit of research. It always feels quite creepy to research people to the degree that we do before we interview them. But we did read that you had a very chance encounter with Vogue's editorial director Edwina McCann and it inspired you to transition into journalism. Now I believe that there may have been a conversation and she invited you to apply for an internship but we would love to hear about this chance encounter.

10:30Yes well she was giving a talk at a school and I wasn't meant to be there I just rocked up and I thought, oh, you know, like I'm meeting someone here. I am vaguely interested in media. At the time, I was still juggling my art gallery jobs and thinking about maybe applying for a clerkship or a legal job. But I had considered writing. I think I put the pieces together and I thought, oh, you know, writing is the through line of everything. And I love literature and I love essay writing. Maybe I could be a journalist. And I think I was maybe 18, 19 at the time. So I thought, oh, whatever, why not go for it?

11:13And she was there, listened to her speak. And I remember that the whole speech was about business and it was nothing to do with fashion or media. It was about reading the economic trends of where technology was headed and how people were consuming media. And I was really won over by that. I thought that it was just such an incredibly intelligent way to look at an industry that I previously hadn't considered. So I went up and I talked to her and I think I was very candid. And I said, I am having a bit of an existential crisis about what to do. And she said, have you ever considered working for a title like Vogue?

11:57And I said, no, not really. And she said, you should probably apply for an internship. And I said, oh, you know, OK, cool. Not a bad idea. She gave me her email. I sent her my resume. I rocked up for an interview a week later and then I interned and then I got a job. And that was that was that. If that's not fate, I don't know what is. That is right place, right time. All of the stars aligning. Totally. It is serendipity. And I think that, I mean, that plays such a big role in where you end up in your career. It is just about timing. But also just don't be afraid to ask the question. I know people say this all the time, but the worst thing you can hear is no, just go up and talk to random people, annoy people, be annoying to get what you want.

12:44Yeah. Don't ask, you don't care. Fast forward to now, you are now the head of brand for Vogue. I wish that you could go back and sit alongside that 18 year old listening to that speech. Can you honestly imagine? But what has this role taught you about successful brand building for a publication and title like Vogue? Goodness it has taught me a great deal of agility. I think that when I joined the role I started off as a writer and then I became a features writer before my role became more senior and evolved into brand building but it's taught me that storytelling encompasses many many things beyond words.

13:26Words will always be at the core of what I do and I will always find an unhealthy amount of satisfaction in putting a sentence together and editing someone else's sentences. But over the course of my few years here at Vogue, I've learned how to produce video, I've learned how to foster commercial partnerships, and of course build a brand. Not necessarily build a brand because I was very lucky to be given a brand that has decades of heritage and immense social capital that I still can't really even reckon with on the day to day. It's about how to extend and evolve a brand's legacy to make sure that it keeps up with what modern readers want, what modern women need, and perhaps what they're lacking in other forms of media.

14:23and constantly having my ear to the ground. I think that building a brand for a title like Vogue is about walking the tightrope between accessibility and a certain aspirational quality because Vogue will always be a little bit mythical, I think, in the world of fashion. It's like Kleenex for tissues. I don't know if that's a weird analogy. That's not the analogy I thought you'd throw in. That's for sure. Sorry. So it's kind of, it has become almost synonymous with fashion, the synergy there with the industry. So how do you make sure that this brand continues to be pushing the forefront of what fashion means, but also meeting people where they are and giving them the content that they want and that they deserve?

15:14I think safe to say there is a strong mystique around Vogue. But I love what you spoke about in obviously working on legacy, you know, legacy media feels like we're underselling Vogue to even put it in that conversation because it is just a phenomenon that has, as you said, been decades and decades in the making. How do you find, you know, looking after legacy versus the challenges there versus an infancy brand? What would you sort of foresee as those challenges? totally i think with an infancy brand it's gosh i mean it's hard to grow anything from the ground up but the most beautiful thing about an infancy brand is that you can really do anything and not that i can't do anything in the job that i have but i am not just looking out for myself it's like I'm looking out for this thing that I have like a pet hamster or I'm incubating an egg.

16:13Sorry, I'm really coming up with all of these weird analogies at the moment. No, I love to. Growing something else that's been given to me and it's a responsibility. Whereas I think if I had an infancy brand, maybe I would be throwing the toddler around a little bit more. There is a certain fragility to a legacy brand, which I think is quite ironic because it's built on such a strong and long-lasting foundation. You're constantly asking yourself, is this on brand? Is this where Vogue should be heading? What should Vogue be speaking on? What does Vogue mean? What should Vogue mean to the next generation of people who want to enter fashion and are in love with the fashion industry?

16:58There are so many questions that you ask yourself before you do anything. And that applies to things as simple as Instagram captions, to things as lengthy as a 2000 word cover story. So having that constant back and forth and having that line of questioning and constantly testing everything that you're doing. You're the custodian. Exactly. You are a custodian. Well, speaking of 2000 word cover pieces, there's obviously been some incredible pieces that you have penned for many publications. Is there one that stands out to you that you felt, you know, the most proud of? Or is there one that you remember the first time it went out going, that feels the most me?

17:40Yeah, I, and this is a bit of a strange one because it's not for Vogue, but it was for GQ when I was head of brand for GQ. It was my first ever cover story. I did it with Liam Lawson, who is an F1 driver. At the time, he'd just been signed to the second Red Bull seat. And now he's with Racing Bulls. But we did an interview. I was on leave technically. So I'd found out that I was doing the cover story two days before I flew to Japan. And we'd been in conversations with his agent, Michaela, for a few months beforehand. I love F1. I have loved F1 for years. It was a real obsession of mine and being able to sit down with him for an hour.

18:29So I was in Kyoto at the time. And then when I Zoom called him, he was in Spain testing for the first GP. And we sat down for an hour, an hour and a half. And we just had this conversation. Athletes are so fascinating because they are so absolutely pledged to excellence in their sport. they very rarely have room in their life for little else so they can often make the worst interview subjects because you can ask them about their career what they want what they do and very often the answer will be I've just tried really hard this is all I have I'm fully committed and that is 100 % honest but they don't do anything but their sport and I think with the added layer on top of that is that when you're dealing with a sport like F1, there is so much red tape around what you can say, who says it, how much time you have with an athlete.

19:30So that interview with Liam is seared into my brain is because we got so much time. What I love about that is, and we get it a lot in face-to-face, is this kind of uninterrupted time where you get to ask people questions that don't feel like the PR machine answer. Oh, totally. I think they're my favourite when you're like, yes we're gonna ask you something you've never been asked before or you kind of get this unfiltered version it's the best version of someone and it builds affinity like people gravitate towards that there's an affection towards it I am definitely going to go and read that piece now because it sounds like a very special one let me know how you find it I can't believe it's an F1 fan I haven't read it I'm so sorry so we fast forward you're at Vogue now and look as I said Vogue has mystique, it has allure, there must be some incredibly exciting people, events, runway experiences that you, you know, even shoots you were just explaining you have exposure to.

20:30What's been the biggest pinch me moment working at Vogue? Oh, that's a really good question. I think that what I was saying before about me desensitizing myself to the job. I think in the first couple of years, it was almost a coping mechanism because you write the story and objectively it goes out to millions of people and you can see the numbers in the back end and you know how many people have read your story. And it is an incomprehensible amount of people. And you have to almost numb yourself to that in order to not freak out. So I think that pinching myself for me is a very active thing. I'm often on set or I'm interviewing a celebrity and in the moment I will not think of them as a celebrity at all.

21:24I will think of them as a very normal if unusually attractive person who is talking to me about a project that they're passionate about. I have to pinch myself afterwards. I think whenever I have a really amazing conversation with someone I would have never expected like I sat down with Paul Meskel for Gladiator and we had a very very lovely conversation about the most random things and I think maybe one of the first pinch me moments was talking with Haim ahead of Laneway Haim I'm obsessed with Haim they have been in my most listened to in my Spotify like roundups for years and seeing the three of those sisters I think it sent me to outer space but in the moment you have to you have to be so calm and collected and it doesn't really sink in until until maybe even the story goes up or they post about it or they reach back out to you and say that was a really lovely conversation so yeah I think those are the moments that stand out to me Jija Hadid also very beautiful and very lovely yeah I imagine you have a lot of like be cool be cool moments like don't fangirl don't fangirl do you ever have like a little walk off you know the conversational walk-off set and go yeah it sets in after I think in the conversation everything goes away and it's just a person in front of me the one moment where I have been completely starstruck is probably seeing Zendaya and speaking to Zendaya.

23:00I wasn't processing anything but that's because she is so beautiful that even if she weren't a celebrity I would be gobsmacked. You'd still be disassociating and levitating out of your body even if she she didn't have the acclaimed 100 % I'd just be drooling. She is exceptionally beautiful it is quite um quite distracting. The official celebrations have all wrapped up but we're still clinging on to those last moments of summer with our friends. And no matter what the occasion is, people usually bring along their go-to drinks. If you're ready for a reset though, you might be better off grabbing a low alcohol option from Dan Murphy's.

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24:16The next generation of low and non-alcoholic drinks is just so good, you won't be missing out on a thing. Dan Murphy does all the groundwork on what's new and what's trending in drinks, whether you feel like drinking or not. Head in store or be inspired on the app and remember to choose to drink wise. A huge thank you to Dan Murphy's for making this episode of Stylish possible. OK, one thing we love to do on Face to Face is a bit of a rapid fire wreck. So I know we've done the swap. We know that Paula's choice is your swap. But our audience love a recommendation. and I just think given you're the head of brand for Vogue, it would be so remiss of us not to ask you.

24:58I'd love to ask 50, but we're going to keep it really tight with five. First one is a label that we should keep our eye on this year. Ooh, I will actually say the label that I'm wearing right now, Little Yarn, which is a label based out of Byron Bay. I love supporting an Australian label and they have been on the rise in somewhat of a cult brand for the last few years but they have been on an absolute tear recently and I think that they are going to just see more and more success. Our audience love an Australian swap so they're going to love that rec so much. The other is a social media account that you think that our audience should follow.

25:38Oh, I think that everyone should follow Amy O'Dell, who is one of the most incisive fashion journalists of our generation. She writes all of these incredibly candid interviews and features with different agents of the fashion industry in a way that you might not expect. So I was reading one of her most recent pieces about the reaction to the most recent ready-to-wear and couture shows except she was speaking with vics which are very important clients so people who are wealthy beyond imagination and their opinions on the clothes which i think was such an interesting way to step out of my bubble completely of fashion commentary and fashion media and think about the people who are actually affording the luxury that we're writing about.

26:32And to throw in another one, Louis Pisano, who I think is one of the most incredible writers, commentators, media figures in fashion as well. I love both of those. Also, what a great insight to go to the VICs because we all sit in our ivory towers judging runway shows and it's like, I'm not buying, you know. I'm not buying. I'm going to swap. Yeah, Jonathan Anderson's Sior is not something I will be shopping but I love to watch it. What's a must-read book for creatives? Oh my gosh that is so hard. Can I? You can give as many as you want. Oh okay great. Yeah I'm not gonna I'm not gonna hold you to rules.

27:08Okay thank you so much. Ways of Seeing by John Berger was the book that started it all for me. It made me fall in love with art history, with everything that an image can mean, a portrait can mean. On top of that, essays by Linda Nochlin, who one of her most seminal ones is Great Women Artists, which is basically discussing gender politics through the lens of art history and why women have not allowed to be great throughout history. The other one is a really recent one, actually Babel by R.F. Kuang who is one of my favorite authors contemporary authors I confession I don't read that much contemporary fiction but R.F.

27:58Kuang is maybe the most talented writer that I've seen come out in the last decade I think that Babel completely rewired my brain chemistry on what language means how language can be power and sadism but also freedom and how you can reclaim your identity through what you say and acknowledging where words come from in such a beautiful philip pullman-esque way that whole book is just I sobbed after it. It was amazing. And A Personal Matter by Kenza Buruo-Oe, which is a short one. It's a novella and a friend from a Japanese writer. But the way that those sentences are written, it changed my perspective on what was possible with the English language and metaphor.

28:55there's the first paragraph of the novel talks about the weather like it's a sleeping giant in the summer I think and it was every line was a revelation about what language could be so those are my those are my recommendations off the top of my head but I could speak forever about it do you know what we might need to get you on the shameless book club because honestly oh my god the way that you have just spoken about these authors and these titles your passion and admiration is just shining through so I feel like we've got to get you on another shameless pillar we'll just keep you on rotation each quarter let's talk yes last but not least your desert island beauty product oh my gosh okay so I can't take my Paula's Choice Exfolant because then I'll just be sandpaper it will be really bad I it would it would be the Mecca sunscreen oh do you know what Gladys I'm really glad you said that because I used to work on the Mecca Cosmetica brand.

29:50So I have a strong affinity for that sunscreen. So great answer. I need a vat of it. They did do a super size over the holiday season, I believe. Do you use the To Save Face lotion or do you use the To Save Face serum? I use the lotion. Yeah, fantastic. I haven't tried the serum, but are you putting me onto a holy grail? Maybe I've just reverse wrecked you. Like you've given me your wreck, I'll give you mine. It depends on your skin type, but I really do like that serum silky finish. Perfect. Well, I will take you up on it. Now that we know all of your recommendations and we all get to be 10 % smarter for them and 10 % more sun protected, take me through a day in the life of Vogue's Head of Brand.

30:31I feel like I've just spoken about you in third person. You know what? I will speak about myself in third person maybe. Great. Just to follow on. A day in the life of Vogue's Head of Brand, it varies day to day. So there's a lot of spontaneity. A very regular, not stressful, no ambulance call kind of day will look like me. I'll get in at around maybe 8, 8.30. That's usually when I start work because I'll be catching up on all of the global content that's been published overnight, any global communications that have happened that I'm not across because I was dead to the world. and then kind of making a content plan for the whole day.

31:17So I'll start collecting things, saving things. Maybe I'll cut together a quick video to put up if something's happened overnight, like this morning I woke up and then I cut a video of Margot Robbie together. She was looking amazing. And then I came here. We've also got to talk about that cover. Oh my goodness me. We spoke about this on our Wednesday episode the other week. Oh my goodness. Well done, Vogue. Thank you so much. It was a mammoth effort from the whole team and we're really proud of it. So you should be. So yes, you clip Margot. That's an awful job in the morning. A terrible job making a thirst trap of Margot Robbie at 8am.