Anna Wintour has overseen her last cover as editor-in-chief of American Vogue, with the December 2025 issue featuring actor Timothée Chalamet on a 'planet' against a NASA starfield. The cover, photographed by Annie Leibovitz, marks the end of her 37-year tenure before she steps away to focus on roles as global editorial director and chief content officer at Condé Nast.
The cover has drawn mixed reactions online, with some calling it 'weird' and others criticising it as 'offensive with the budgets you have'. Jeremy Leslie, founder of magCulture, described it as 'so weird that after your initial ick, you start thinking, but maybe she knows something that I don't know'. The image references Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's The Little Prince, with Chalamet posed as the boy on the moon.
Wintour's first cover in 1988 paired Guess jeans with a Christian Lacroix sweater, a radical high-low mix. Her tenure included iconic covers such as Madonna in 1989, supermodels in 1992, Britney Spears in 2001, Michelle Obama in 2009, and Beyoncé in 2018. However, some covers faced criticism, including the 2008 LeBron James and Gisele Bündchen cover seen as racially insensitive, and the 2010 Asma al-Assad feature regarded as a puff piece.
Chloe Malle now takes over as head of editorial content at Vogue, with no editor-in-chief role. Amy Odell, author of Anna: The Biography, noted that Wintour 'played it very safe overall' but 'poked the bear strategically'. Leslie believes the final cover is a 'huge statement', challenging Malle to find new ways to spark conversation in 2026.
