Lost in Space : Has Vogue Left the Atmosphere?

Timothée Chalamet floats across the new US Vogue cover like a pop-culture astronaut, except the warp drive appears to be broken. The image reads less like an audacious fashion statement and more like a bad late-night Photoshop joke: grainy compositing, a vacuum of subtlety, and the awkward feeling that someone tried to manufacture “mystery” on a tight deadline. The subject looks lost in space and somehow so does the magazine.

Fashion critic Lyas summed it up in his viral TikTok: “Is this rage bait? (…) I asked Vogue to take risks. And that is the risk they are taking?” Julia Fox was even blunter in the comments: “I think it’s done.” Together, they captured the collective reaction, the cover did what spectacle always hopes to do: it started a conversation. Just not the one Vogue had in mind.

What complicates the critique is that Vogue is not exactly the same ship it was a decade ago. In late June 2025 Anna Wintour stepped back from day-to-day leadership of American Vogue; she remains Condé Nast’s Chief Content Officer and Global Editorial Director for Vogue, overseeing the brand worldwide. Since September, American Vogue’s editorial direction has been in the hands of Chloe Malle, the new Head of Editorial Content, signaling a generational hand-off, though one still under Wintour’s gravitational pull. Whether this cover marks the dawn of Malle’s vision or simply a transitional wobble is hard to say.

For decades Vogue curated an aspirational world: gatekeeping in the service of taste, translating runway strangeness into the language of desire. Lately, the house that once defined what was “in” seems unsure what it even stands for. Playing it safe hasn’t worked, so now it’s swinging for virality. Yet spectacle without conviction is hollow.

Meanwhile, influencers like Lyas have become the real translators of fashion. With his Fashion-Week watch parties and live commentary from show venues, he opens doors that Vogue once kept closed, making high fashion feel participatory, not prescribed. The irony is sharp: what was once the magazine’s cultural power has been outsourced to creators who grew up questioning it.

So can Vogue re-enter the orbit of cultural authority it once commanded?
That depends on whether it can find its footing again, not in space, but on the ground. Right now, it feels as though the magazine is drifting, weightless, hoping the spectacle will substitute for substance. To land safely, Vogue will have to remember what made it matter in the first place: a clear point of view, and the courage to pursue it.

by Isabell Gielisch