During André Leon Talley's first magazine job, alongside Andy Warhol at Interview, a fateful meeting with Karl Lagerfeld began a decades-long friendship with the enigmatic designer. Propelled into the upper echelons by his fashion expertise, André moved to Paris as bureau chief of Women's Wear Daily, befriending fashion's most important designers. But as André made friends, he also made enemies. A racist encounter with a member of the house of Yves Saint Laurent sent him back to New York and into the offices of Vogue under Grace Mirabella, where he developed an unlikely bond with Anna Wintour.
As Wintour rose to the top of Vogue's masthead, André ascended as creative director, and soon became the most influential man in fashion. The Chiffon Trenches tells with raw honesty the story of how André not only survived the brutal style landscape but thrived—despite racism, rumors, and all the other challenges of this notoriously ruthless industry—to become one of the most renowned voices and faces in fashion.
Woven throughout are his own-personal struggles, intimate stories of those he has turned to for inspiration, and his Southern roots and ongoing faith, which have guided him since childhood. The result is a highly compelling memoir that captures the essence of a world we all want to know oh so much more about.