It-Girl Plum Sykes Breaks Down Her Viral TikTok

0:05Happy Tuesday. This week we're bringing back a couple of our favourite episodes. Today, you'll be hearing former Vogue editor, writer, and Naughty's It Girl Plum Sipes. I mean, Chloe. I thought you said Naughty It Girl. I was like, ooh, bold. But I realized it was Naughties. She's also a Naughty It Girl, let's be honest. She's a wee bit naughty, that Plum. Yeah. I love that interview, don't you? We get her talking about so many great things. Attending her first Met Gala in 98, when the Met Gala looked totally different. And Anna just said, invite a few friends, fill a table. Can you imagine now?

0:41Just like invite some cute friends. Go crazy. And I think we really wanted to revisit that viral TikTok that I guess it must have been a show that was broadcasted in the 90s about Vogue. But you get her talking about her adult Jane Cabana skirt and about wearing it during the day at the office, which. So funny. Yeah, so, so funny. I also am obsessed with Plum saying that she didn't have time to watch Sex and the City because she was living Sex and the City. And so we get into all of that and more, so stay tuned.

1:25You come to the New Yorker Radio Hour for conversations that go deeper with people you really want to hear from. whether it's Bruce Springsteen or Questlove or Olivia Rodrigo, Liz Cheney, or the godfather of artificial intelligence, Jeffrey Hinton, or some of my extraordinarily well-informed colleagues at The New Yorker. So join us every week on The New Yorker Radio Hour, wherever you listen to podcasts.

1:54First of all, I feel like we should introduce Plum, because to us, Plum is a first-name character. but Plum Sykes, inimitable Vogue writer, a legend at American Vogue, and I'm sure British Vogue too. But Choma, how would you introduce Plum? Because I feel like recently Choma and I were like, oh, we want to have Plum on. And Choma reminded me that when she started at Vogue 15 years ago, she was in charge of booking your travel. And you were always so gracious and thoughtful. And that's really the biggest test of character, I have to say. If young Choma booking your travel has good things to say.

2:28I know. And look at her now. Look where it got her. Editor of British Vogue. See? Book my travel. You never know what's going to happen. Well, I just think it was so funny because Plum was always the writer that was brought in to make people laugh, to bring perspective, to bring character and to bring something sparkling. Humour. Whip. Humour. Yeah. Which is really a tough kind of tall order in the fashion world because there's just not few rare voices like yours. I mean, I think what I always say about the fashion writing particularly, but I think it goes into novel writing as well, is that the difference between me and the other writers, and maybe this is useful for aspiring fashion writers, I don't know, is that I was never a very good reviewer, right?

3:12But what I was always interested in was the dress, but it was the girl in the dress. And then once you start talking to the girl in the dress, all these stories come out. And often, actually, you can get people to be unintentionally funny when you start asking them about their clothes, because they do not feel invaded in the way that if you start asking them personal questions. So I always found that fashion was a way into people, like some of the really, really famous people I've interviewed. I remember interviewing Gwyneth Paltrow. and I've got this question which I actually stole off Susie Menkes.

3:46Oh, do tell. Always at the top of my secret list of fashion interview questions is to ask, if you ask anyone, however famous they are or unfamous, what is your first memory of fashion or clothing, right? They go back to being two or three years old. And I remember I asked this to Gwyneth and she said, it was this pair of jangarees that my father gave me and she was very, very close to her father and she immediately started talking about her father and it was so real and so human and so interesting. Now, if I'd said, oh, tell me about your father or tell me about your boyfriend, you know what? They just clam up and freeze because it feels like an invasion of their privacy.

4:23So I think fashion is an amazing way in. And then on the humour side of it, I just think I don't take fashion very seriously because at the end of the day, I'm like, it's all a bit of a joke, but I like the reader to make, I like to make the reader feel that they're in on the joke, that we're all in on the joke. But I don't think that people often in fashion take it with enough lightness. And I think you just have to have that because it's not World War Three, you know. And what I love about your books, Plum, is that they're so funny and you're so in on the joke as a reader. But also the descriptions of what people are wearing is very important to their character development.

5:07And so, for example, in Wives Like Us, as everyone will soon read, Ian Palmer is the butler who is the sort of the hero we all are, you know, following the story through his eyes. And he has an immaculate collection of vintage loafers. And this comes up as a theme throughout. He needs a place to store them. He that is designing. I mean, there's a whole moment about the loafers, but they're important. I feel I know Ian better because of his loafers. Yes. And I did, I felt like this was such an inside baseball fashion novel because there's such great fashion references. I have to say, I'm really excited for people to read this book.

5:44I feel like for Americans, it's going to hit somewhere between like Downton Abbey meets Big Little Lies. It's sort of that. Oh, right. Okay, Big Little Lies. That's such a good point. I know. Downton Abbey meets Big Little Lies. I love that. I feel like we need to get into the country princess. Oh, yes. Yeah, because for Americans, like I know of the Cotswolds as, to me, that's the Beckhams and Soho Farmhouse and Cutter Brooks and now Miranda Brooks. It's like Brooks's and Beckhams, but I don't have much beyond that. Yeah. Well, I mean, that sort of area that you're talking about, which is the very kind of poshous bit of the Cotswolds, it's really particularly since COVID when a lot of people moved out there, you know, sort of semi full time.

6:30and because it's near enough to London that you can get there within two hours, it's kind of become like the Hamptons of the UK, wouldn't you say? It's the weekend spot. And what's happened is because all these very fashionable people moved out there from London, they have refashioned the countryside into a kind of universe that suits them, right? So that's like Matthew Freud decides I'm going to move to Burford. And you know what? I need a Japanese restaurant, darling. I know. I'm going to open a pub in Burford. And guess what? It's going to have a really expensive sushi restaurant in the basement or whatever.

7:05And now everyone's going to Burford to go to a Japanese restaurant. It's wild. Right? Used to go to Burford to buy some, you know, churned butter. Do you know what I mean? Or some cream or some sweeties in the tourist shop. So these very glamorous women have sort of moved there. The property's incredibly expensive. I'd moved to Gloucestershire, which is also in the Cotswolds. And I started to see around me. And I've been living there for about maybe 10 or 12 years. I love the countryside. I was brought up on a farm. And I just started to notice it's become really glamorous around here. And I also saw that there was all these social occasions that these ladies were having, which were really funny in themselves.

7:45And I think that I thought there is a universe here for me to write about. And actually, I couldn't believe that someone hadn't already written about it because it was a bit like when I wrote... I thought that. I know. It's wild. It's bizarre, isn't it? There's been lots of articles about the place and the world, but there hasn't been anything that really goes into the women and what they care about and all the obsessions and the competition and the tablescaping. Oh, my God. The tablescaping. Those country princesses, I call them princesses because they are princesses. They're not going to get muddy.

8:17They're not going to dig up the plants. They're not going to go muck out the stable themselves. But they want that feeling of bucolicness and being outside and it's rural and it's beautiful and it's, you know, it's looking like a postcard. You once sat next to Tom Brady at the Met. Oh, yeah. Oh, my goodness. This is such a funny story. Tell me. It made me laugh so much reading about this. So this was so funny. So I am not into sport at all, right? I can't hit a ball or, you know, do anything. So I was invited to the Met Ball by Anna, which was really nice. And I get to the table and it's Jean-Paul Gaultier's table.

8:55And I absolutely worship Jean-Paul Gaultier. Right. Have you guys met him? No, never met him. Love his clothes. He's a living legend. And the couple of times I met him in Paris, and I was very lucky, had lunch with him with Anna. And everything he says, doesn't speak very good English, but everything he says, he ends with this, and it was a beautiful love story. He's like, everything is a love story. So I'm sitting on his table. I'm super excited. And then there's Jean-Paul Gaultier on one end, And then Jolie Richardson, the actress opposite, who's in The Gentleman at the moment. She's lovely.

9:28And then Giselle Bündchen, a little bit down the table from me. And then sitting next to me, this incredibly good looking man. Who you didn't know. Who I'm like, OK, that's her boyfriend. And I thought to myself, well, she's obviously going out with a male model. OK, I'm going to be really polite. I'm going to make conversation. So I turn around to him and I go, hello, my name's Plum and I work for Vogue. What's your name? And he went, my name's Tom Brady. And I went, oh, okay. So do you work in fashion as well? And he looked at me and he just went, I work in sport. Amazing answer. Then, then he clearly turned his back on me because I was, you know, didn't know who he was.

10:12He then turns around to Giselle and they snog throughout the entire dinner. Oh, my God. to the point where Jolie Richardson becomes very English about it and the performance is starting because they're snogging their heads together. She can't see whoever was singing. So she threw bread rolls at their heads. Stop it. Oh, my God, that's a brilliant story. It's one of those ones when, you know, by the end of the dinner, everyone's a bit kind of drunk and a bit whatever and it's all got out of control. But anyway, that was my Tom Brady-Giselle story. Wow. I mean, Plum, I have to say... Oh, my God.

10:45to imagine what it was like the first time you went to the Met 25 years ago versus today when it's truly like a military operation with Pentagon level security. And the first time you went was in 98. And Anna just said, come, have a table, invite some friends, which I love. Oh my gosh, so different. I know, it's so funny. I'd literally, I just started at Vogue, I think like six months before. and I don't think I even knew what the Met Ball was. I certainly didn't know what the Costume Institute was and she said to me, oh, you know, this is party. I'd like you to have a table and I had no idea what a great honour this was but I thought, oh, well, that sounds fun.

11:30So I thought, okay, I'll get a few people together and I'd better find some glamorous people and actually Minnie Driver had just come out in like Goodwill Hunting and I think I knew her from London so I was like, let's get Minnie and let's get Kate, her sister. And then I got my twin sister and her husband. And then we got some English designers like I think Matthew Williamson and a few others. And I remember going to this party and of course as well, it was all about, you know, what were we going to wear? And it wasn't such a mad scramble for dresses because it wasn't full of celebrities. There was like, it was an insider fashion party for fashion designers, Upper East Side society ladies and then you had the odd celebrity, which there was a real buzz around them, a real excitement.

12:15So I remember walking to the fashion closet at Vogue, as one did, and going, oh, that looks nice. John Galliano, toile de juif slip dress, right? I didn't wear any jewellery. I didn't get hair and makeup. I could have virtually worn flip-flops with it. Do you know what I mean? And I felt so amazing in that dress. I was so devastated that I had to give it back to the closet the next day. But this is the whole Cinderella thing. And I just remember that evening was so magical because I had never had that experience, that New York thing of that really private party with incredibly interesting people.

12:51But I remember that night that Sting played and I was a huge police fan and I had a huge crush on Sting when I was 17. I mean, like message in a bottle. Do you know what I mean? So good. All those videos. And he was so cute. And he was a school teacher. And he came out and played and sang. And I was just like, I'm in heaven. So fun. I mean, what was it like working at Vogue back then? Because I almost feel like I always think of Sex and the City and I just think. Well, I also think of, Flum, do you know that you're famous on TikTok? No. Oh, come on. I'm not on TikTok. You've got to know. No. What are my famines for on TikTok?

13:30Flum, there's an amazing clip from like an old, I don't know what it was from, something they filmed at Vogue offices 20 years ago. Oh, is it the Dolce & Gabbana skirt? Yes, yes. Yes, it's so good. Someone sent it to me. The clothes that people wear here in the day are probably clothes that normal people would wear on their most glamorous night out of the year. So what happened was the BBC made a TV documentary called Boss Women, right? And Anna Wintour was one of the Boss Women and she decided for whatever reason that I was going to be the kind of writer who was featured in that. And so the BBC crew were following me around to various stories and things.

14:09And actually, have you seen the clip with Amy Sacco, which is really funny when I ask her how much she spends a year on clothes and she says$250 ,000. I go, oh, okay. And just wrote it down in my book like it was, you know, whatever. Anyway, it's funny. But there was one time when they come into my little tiny office and they're asking me what I'm wearing. And I'm wearing sort of evening wear, basically. And I was wearing this really chic Dolce & Gabbana skirt covered in roses and this little white top. And I just sit there in the most sort of balmy way saying... Do you know what I mean? Who's going to go and wear a chiffon Dolce & Gabbana skirt like this?

14:48To the office. Only me or only someone who works at Vogue. LAUGHTER

14:56Right now, in movies, in the opera, even in pop music, Divinely inspired women are everywhere. This week on Critics at Large, we make our case. Saints are having a moment. Look, I can spout off any number of cliches, but they're all true. The world is moving faster and faster. Materialism is now reaching every single corner of the globe. It's very hard to say no and to say stop and to say I will do without. And I think that explains some of the modern cultural appeal. I'm Vincent Cunningham. Join me and my co-hosts on Critics at Large from The New Yorker. Find us every Thursday, wherever you get your podcasts.

15:39Plum, I want to know, you started in the UK as Isabel Blow's assistant, and then you started modeling for McQueen. How did that trajectory happen? So basically, I went to British Fogon Work Experience, right? And once I got there, I was absolutely desperate to stay, and I just floated around being a fashion assistant to various people. And then I met Isabella Blow and I thought, God, I really want to work for her. That would be so fun. She was such an interesting person. I mean, she had the most extraordinary taste and she could see a trend or a designer coming like three years before everyone else, almost too early, you know.

16:18But I said to her, can I work for you? And she said, why would someone as conservative as you want to work for someone as eccentric as me? And I was like, that's why. and so I worked yeah so precisely is about it so I worked for her for probably about only about six months and she was working on this massive shoot for Stephen Meisel and Joe McKenna who I mean Stephen Meisel is still my hero sort of sort of working for Izzy and then because Izzy was so embedded with the young designers I obviously met lots and lots of designers and photographers and some of them would say to me can you can I take your picture like I think Tim Walker took a portrait of me, actually.

16:58Nice. I wonder where that is. Ooh, that's fine. And then when we were doing the shoot, Steve and Mizell said, oh, you know, can't we have Plum in the pictures? So one minute I was being the fashion assistant, you know, with the fishnet tights and the hats, and the next minute I was in the pictures. So I had this amazing experience of having these, you know, incredible photographs taken, which, you know, Garen doing my hair and Denise Marquis doing my face, and she, like, rebuilt your face for the makeup. But the funny thing was Alexander McQueen said to me, can you model in my show? And I was like it's a bit embarrassing because I work at Vogue and all my colleagues are going to be in the front row.

17:33Do you know what I mean? It was just like but he made everyone do it and actually I think doing those little bits of modelling I also modelled in a Prada show. Wow, I didn't know that. That was terrifying. Yeah, what was that like? Awful because I was backstage with Christy, Linda and Naomi and I just wanted to die. I just wanted to die. But anyway, those pictures are really funny as well. But I think actually doing it was amazing for my career as a fashion journalist, because I met all the hair and makeup people. I met all the designers backstage. I met all these amazing production people like Simon Costin.

18:11So I met the sort of behind the scenes people that you don't normally meet as a journalist. And, you know, I just I got to know people like Alexandra on a completely different level, because, you know, when he was backstage at one of his own shows, he was like a hysterical wild animal. It was very, very funny. And he really enjoyed himself. And I particularly remember doing this show called The Birds. Do you remember that one with the birds printed across everything? And he was just having such a good time backstage. It was like a full party every time, you know, we went back there. What was it like moving to New York?

18:47I mean, having done that move myself, what was it? And you obviously worked with Izzy Blow. So you had a sense of, you know, what was the first thing that struck you? I'm sure people still ask you about the difference between New York style and London style. But also Plums, New York in like the late 90s, early 2000s. I feel like that was real glamour. Sex in the city. It was very glamorous. I mean, it was. Stilettos and Cosmos. It was the era of the Park Avenue princesses. It was the era of Sex in the City, which, by the way, side note, I want to say I was so busy going out to parties that I never watched Sex and the City while it was running.

19:26I never watched it. I didn't even have HBO. I was like, how do I have time to watch TV? Listen, I'm too busy being Carrie Bradshaw to watch Carrie Bradshaw on television. And I did not have HBO because you had to pay a subscription for it. And at the time, again, it seemed outrageous that you were going to pay for an extra subscription for this one show. It was so funny. And then, of course, I ended up interviewing Sarah Jessica Parker years later. And actually, of course, by that point, I had watched all of it. And I then ended up being in the Sex and the City movie as myself. Oh, right. With André Leontali as himself.

20:01I love. To go back to your question, what was it like moving? It was, I was very lucky because my twin sister Lucy had already been living in New York. So I didn't feel isolated and dropped in a big pond like an expat. I thought, I've kind of got family here. But I remember very clearly thinking, I really, really, you know, I really want some fresh fruit or some fresh food or whatever. And thinking, I don't know where to buy an apple. I don't know where to buy fresh carrots. And where is everything? Yeah, the grocery stores, I always feel like they're just nowhere. They're nowhere there. And I kept thinking, oh, my God, Anna Winters hired me to come here.

20:39And I meant to know where are the coolest shoes, where are the coolest clothes, where are the coolest designers. And I don't even know where to buy an apple. you know. But at the same time, Anna introduced me to everyone. She kind of took me round to every single appointment in Paris, New York, Milan. I met everyone very quickly. And I also learned that in America, as opposed to England, you can pick up the phone and you go, hello, my name's Plum Sykes, and I work at Vogue, and I'd really like to meet you. And they go, come on down, and they mean it. But in England, it was always you had to wait to be introduced, and was there a contact and this and the other.

21:16And I just really learned in America to just pick up the phone if I wanted to meet someone. And I still do that now. And English people love it. They all want to meet people. Everyone wants to meet people. But it just gave me this confidence. And do you have a favourite Met moment? Because, I mean, you went to the Met. I mean, how many times have you been? Okay, so first of all, I think I've probably been to the Met like 12 or 13 times. Yeah, I imagine. I think my, I've got two favourite Met dresses that I've worn. There was one year, I can't remember what year it was, and there was an Alexander McQueen dress that I borrowed.

21:50It was before he died. And it was a long black column of taffeta and it had a huge bow across the front. And it was very Audrey Hepburn and it was very dramatic. It was beautiful silhouette. And I'm someone who is obsessed with silhouette because I actually believe that all of fashion is about silhouette. And I just had my hair in a bun and I had a white rose on the side of my hair. And I think that's the best I ever looked at any man, actually. Oh, that sounds fabulous. I'm going to go away and Google that. It was so chic and simple. And the other dress that I absolutely adored, and I still wear it if I'm invited to something very, very glamorous, Sarah Burton made me a custom couture, black satin embroidered beaded dress for the train, which was for the Alexander McQueen show.

22:41And that is incredible. It's got really long sleeves and the sharpest shoulders and like the bum makes your bum look incredible. And, you know, and the beading on it was just to die for. And, you know, I just think she's a brilliant designer. I mean, I'm full of high hopes. We want her to come back too. I think she's coming back. Yeah, I think so too. Say no more. 100%. I heard it here first. Plum, I'm so excited for your visit and I'm so excited for our lunch. Well, listen, I'm going to see you at our lunch. I know. I know. I'm so excited to see you at lunch. I can't wait. We're so thrilled. We're so, we're all looking forward to it.

23:14Bye.

23:25The Run Through with Vogue is a production of Condé Nast. The show is produced by Susie Lechtenberg, Chelsea Daniel, and Alex John Burns, with engineering from Jake Loomis, Gabe Caroga, and James Yost. It is mixed by Mike Kutchman. Chris Bannon is Conde Nast's head of Global Audio.

23:51Hi, I'm Rebecca Ford, senior awards correspondent at Vanity Fair and co-host of Little Gold Men. Oscar season is upon us. Little Gold Men takes you behind the scenes of the race for the biggest prize in Hollywood. There's a hundred wrestlers in the room, but only one can be Oscar nominated. Whether you're a movie lover or an industry buff, Little Gold Men from Vanity Fair has everything you need to know about this year's Oscar race. Follow and listen to Little Gold Men wherever you get your podcasts.