STYLIST NICOLETTA SANTORO
Nicoletta
Santoro
Stylist, creative director, collaborator of legends. And the woman who saw, before almost anyone else, what a fashion editorial could actually do.
While at Italian Vogue as a fashion assistant, I was exposed to some of the greatest talents in the fashion industry. One of those I remember enjoying working with was Nicoletta Santoro. Those specific collaborations with Lindbergh, Roversi, Meisel, Turbeville contained some of the most beautiful photography I had ever seen. That was the talent of the late Franca Sozzani: she had a strong vision, she chose to work with certain people, and gave them the creative freedom to create real art and expression of the times.
The fashion editorial as we understand it today owes a specific debt to one woman and one magazine. When Franca Sozzani took the helm at Vogue Italia in 1988, she steered it away from the typical glossy escapism seen in other international editions and transformed the magazine into an edgy, conceptual canvas. Working closely with Steven Meisel, she addressed plastic surgery obsession, environmental disasters, domestic crises: subjects that no other fashion publication had the nerve to touch. The issues were controversial and, in retrospect, culturally monumental.
What made this possible was not just courage but trust. Sozzani had a strong vision and she chose to work with certain people and gave them creative freedom to create real art. The stylists she gathered around her in the 1990s, among them Carlyne Cerf de Dudzeele, Joe McKenna, and Camilla Nickerson, were not executing briefs. They were co-authoring something. Nicoletta Santoro was one of those people.
Born in Milan, Nicoletta Santoro arrived at Vogue Italia through an unlikely route. She had studied languages and journalism, from a good family, intending to become a professor of glottology. Fashion kidnapped her. "La moda mi rapì," she says, "con grande disappunto dei miei, che la videro come una caduta in basso." Her first editorial was well received. She got a cover.
She began as an assistant to Manuela Pavesi at Vogue Italia under Franco Sartori, who taught her method and precision. From there she began building her own roster of young photographers: Peter Lindbergh, Paolo Roversi, Steven Meisel, each of whom was already working for Franca Sozzani's Lei and could make the jump to Vogue Italia. She understood them each precisely: Lindbergh was cinematic and tormented, Meisel was outrageous, Roversi sentimental and painterly. She matched the story to the eye.
In 1985, a Yohji Yamamoto catalogue arrived in the Vogue Italia offices shot by a photographer she had never heard of: Max Vadukul. His first professional work. It had, she immediately recognised, the violence of photojournalism, the street sensibility of a documentary photographer, and a sharp sense of satire. "Ho pensato: questo mi manca!" she says: this is what I'm missing.
"Trovare Max fu un'impresa. Andai a New York per mostrargli la moda prima di scattarla; questo sciagurato abitava in un loft in Grand Street, dovetti salire al quinto piano senza ascensore trascinando non so quanti sacchi pieni di vestiti per trovarmi davanti un individuo con capelli afro, che poi scoprii essere una parrucca, in T-shirt e sneakers bianche, seduto su un'altalena. Era Max. Mi sono un po' spaventata!"
She hauled bags of clothes up five flights of stairs with no elevator and found a man sitting on a swing with an afro (later revealed to be a wig) in a white t-shirt and white sneakers. That was Max. She was a little frightened. Their first story together was called Cartoon, the idea sparked by two golf jumpers decorated with cartoon characters. Vadukul worked fast, moving through the streets, shooting everywhere without asking permission, mixing top models with actors and casual bystanders. When Vogue Italia saw the result, they were shocked. They published it anyway, and then commissioned a second story.
"Forse perché le sue foto mischiavano la realtà caotica con l'eleganza mai volgare della moda."
Nicoletta Santoro · "Perhaps because his photos mixed chaotic reality with the never-vulgar elegance of fashion."Their second shoot was in Rome, and something changed. One evening Max positioned himself outside her room at the Hotel de la Ville, seated on a chair, dressed in an exceptionally elegant dressing gown by Scott Crolla. He nodded proudly when she told this story. Then he sent cactus plants instead of flowers. She did not understand the gesture. If this was courtship, it was decidedly surreal. Their professional meetings suffered an abrupt interruption after the Rome shoot, but a stream of love letters followed. She did not respond to them, which he confirms with feeling. But the letters cracked something open in her. "La mia scorza si è fratturata," she says: my shell fractured. She began to think: this strange person, so outside every convention, I like them.
The rebel Nicoletta became pregnant with twins and married Max in a hurry, because otherwise, in a life built entirely around travel, the children would have had nowhere to follow. Her parents' disappointment was considerable, she remembers. But they showed great modernity. Complementary as opposite colours: if he is a rock jump, she is a slow landing. But nothing prevents them from swapping roles. Something in the intimacy they allow to show, the embraces, the conspiratorial glances, the sentences started by one and finished by the other, suggests they know this well.
They moved to Paris, where Nicoletta took editorial positions at Paris Vogue and at Égoïste: the avant-garde French publication that published when it had something worth saying and not before. Working on Égoïste brought her into sustained collaboration with two of the greatest portraitists of the 20th century, Helmut Newton and Richard Avedon. The black-and-white images she styled for those issues, including covers featuring Malgosia Bela and Mick Jagger, have the quality of things made without compromise, which is the only way Égoïste ever operated.
In New York, Max became the New Yorker's second staff photographer, following Richard Avedon. Nicoletta found her footing through fashion: "Fashion became a form of strength for me as I adjusted to a new life in New York." She collaborated with Annie Leibovitz for Vanity Fair and Richard Avedon for the New Yorker, while continuing her freelance work for Vogue Italia. She later became International Fashion Director at Large for Vogue China for four years, and was appointed Creative Director at Large for Town & Country. She also consulted for Romeo Gigli, Jil Sander, Alberta Ferretti, Cerruti, Carolina Herrera, and Donna Karan.
"Fashion became a form of strength for me as I adjusted to a new life in New York."
Nicoletta SantoroThe shoot that began everything. Street photography, actors and models mixed, no permissions asked. Comparse casuali and top models in one frame. Vogue Italia was shocked. They commissioned a second story anyway.
An iconic story exploring the energy of Parisian street life and fashion. A masterclass in styling dynamic movement and tension in clothing.
A couture supplement featuring Stella Tennant embodying fierce theatrical haute couture. One of Santoro's most celebrated projects. Powerful body language. Conceptual intensity.
The avant-garde French publication that published only when it had something worth saying. Enduring black-and-white imagery. Covers featuring Malgosia Bela and Mick Jagger among the defining images.
Inspired by Michelangelo Antonioni's film. Street energy and visual tension: chaotic reality mixed with the never-vulgar elegance of fashion.
A moody, romantic and haunting spread shot in an empty country house. Cinematic, vintage aesthetics mixed with contemporary luxury. Lindbergh at his most atmospheric.
Trained under Manuela Pavesi. Built her own roster: Lindbergh, Meisel, Roversi, Vadukul. First cover. The Cartoon shoot that changed everything.
Editorial at Paris Vogue and the legendary Egoiste. Close collaboration with Helmut Newton and Richard Avedon. Married Max Vadukul.
Annie Leibovitz for Vanity Fair. Richard Avedon for the New Yorker. Max as the New Yorker's second staff photographer. Fashion as anchor in a new city.
International Fashion Director at Large for four years. Building the visual language of one of the world's fastest-growing editions.
Creative Director at Large. Returned to Milan. The apartment overlooking Parco Oriana Fallaci, with the walls that remember everything.
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