Graydon Carter steps down as Vanity Fair Editor

By

Emily Jensen

Published
Sep 7, 2017

The famed editor will step down from the magazine in December after 25 years, making his announcement to his editorial team on Thursday, the New York Times reports. Condé Nast has yet to announce who will replace him.

 
Graydon Carter succeeded Tina Brown as editor-in-chief of Vanity Fair in 1992. His tenure at the magazine has seen an emphasis on celebrity culture, with profiles of the likes of Angelina Jolie and George Clooney and numerous high-profile portraits courtesy of Annie Leibovitz. Carter also instituted the annual Vanity Fair Oscar party.
 
Carter will oversee the 2018 edition of the magazine’s annual Hollywood Issue prior to his departure. The 68-year-old says he will offer suggestions for his replacement to the magazine’s publisher, Condé Nast, but he has yet to publicly name a successor.

As with many publishers, Condé Nast has struggled in recent years to remain profitable and relevant in the digital age. Earlier this month, the company announced another round of restructuring that would include moving from a single-publisher structure to a group-publishing model.
 
The Ottawa native considered staying longer at the magazine following the election of Donald Trump, a subject whom Carter regularly criticized in his 1980s publication Spy magazine. However he says that after 25 years it felt like the right time to go. "I want to leave while the magazine is on top," he told the New York Times. "I want to leave while it’s in vibrant shape, both in the digital realm and the print realm. And I wanted to have a third act — and I thought, time is precious.”
 
Carter arrived in New York City in the 1970s and procured a job at Time magazine before cofounding Spy in 1986. He led The New York Observer before succeeded Brown, who left Vanity Fair to oversee the New Yorker.
 
The famed editor will take a vacation in Provence following his exit from Vanity Fair, though he says he already has plans to write while in France.