Goodbye Vogue Bambini, Conde Nast has announced the magazine will be discontinued along with sister publications including Vogue Spoza and L’Uomo Vogue in Italy.
Long regarded as the kids fashion industry bible the magazine had lost its way recently with messy layouts that looked like Snapchat pages and shoots by photographers who never worked with kids falling way off the standard achieved by many of the newer publications in the field.
When we started Junior Magazine 20 years ago, Vogue Bambini was the only other publication I knew about with decent kids fashion pages and inspired the kids fashion pages in Junior, subsequently visiting Pitti Bimbo, the premier kids fashion trade fair in Florence we discovered Kid’sWear magazine who just beat us to it.
Alongside the rise in digital which has spawned endless kids online magazines the publication was also facing increasing competition from glossy paper competitors from other countries. Since half its subscription was from overseas markets this combined with a loss of revenue from advertising must have dented the profits recently.
Below a shoot from the glory days of Vogue Bambini in 1986 when top fashion photographers filled the pages, not only Bruce Weber as below but also Arthur Elgort, Alex Chatelain and Andre Rau frequently shot for the publication and Carla Sozzani was the director in charge.
A recent shoot by Ellen Von Unwerth was a late attempt to recapture the high fashion ethic but came too little too late.
There are a few Vogue editions that publish seasonal editions, notably Vogue Ninos from Spain but it is a shame that in a country which hosts the top kids fashion fair in the world that the bi-monthly Vogue edition will no longer be there to support it.
All photos by Bruce Weber for Vogue Bambini – all rights reserved
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