Vogue Australia June 2022

Watching Baz Luhrmann take over the Met Gala dance floor, for which he orchestrated the entertainment, felt like the cumulation of a life’s work. And not just for Baz. His new film Elvis will be a huge global success. There is no better way to celebrate that than to edit an issue of Vogue Australia, which he and his partner Catherine Martin (better known as CM) also did in 1994, after they released their breakthrough film, Strictly Ballroom. The impact Bazmark has had on me personally – and not just because I was a very new assistant at Vogue the last time they edited an issue – and creative industries in Australia generally, should not be underestimated. Alongside their colleagues and collaborators who are featured in this issue, they have taught us to dream…

Welcome to this very special June issue in which I want to introduce newcomers to the world of Elvis, explore his ongoing impact on music and culture, and for those who are already Elvis fans, offer an insight into where we, the storytellers, have come from in our own creative journey. To start, our cover shoot with Austin Butler and Olivia DeJonge takes the Elvis aesthetic and interprets it through modern fashion for this time, and in the accompanying story, we reveal the process of translating Elvis and Priscilla’s story for the screen. In ‘Love letters’ (see page 68), Priscilla Presley discusses the evolution of her now-iconic style, while her and Elvis’s granddaughter, Riley Keough, shares the story (on page 88) of her own Australian romance. I also have a conversation…

Catherine Martin “It was great to be able to reconnect with both Austin and Olivia and celebrate our time together on Elvis,” says esteemed Australian costume designer Catherine Martin of her collaboration with Christine Centenera on the looks worn by this month’s cover stars. “As a fashion aficionado it was amazing to have access to such incredible clothes.” Martin was also tasked with styling homegrown supermodel Adut Akech Bior in a series of spectacular couture creations – see page 144. “Adut is an extraordinary model who transcends all expectations. She has the ability to communicate with clothes and the camera in a way I’ve never seen before. It was a real privilege to see her work.” Jamie Heath “Baz Luhrmann and Catherine Martin are like superheroes. They’re larger than life and craft incredible…

NICOLE KIDMAN: “Baz?” BAZ LUHRMANN: “I love how your voice sounds on the phone …” NK: “Oh, Bazzie?” BL: “How are you, my darling love?! My most missed person on the planet?! And I don’t overstate that lightly!” NK: “Oh, my beautiful Baz! I’m good actually, I’m hanging in there. I’m in Nashville right now.” BL: “I fell in love with Nashville making Elvis.” NK: “Did you?” BL: “I was in Nashville a lot – we recorded all the gospel in all those old churches.” NK: “I was at the dentist yesterday, who’s the same dentist that Dolly [Parton] uses! That’s how small-town Nashville is!” [Laughs.] BL: “I love Nashville and I love her, too. I call her the Dolly Lama of LA, you know?”[Both laugh.] NK: “How good does the film look, Baz? I sent you that email, going,…

ROMEO + JULIET Romeo + Juliet masterfully melded 90s sartorial stylings with the religious iconography of Shakespeare’s original text. The angelic white of Claire Danes’s Juliet was emblematic of the decade’s minimalism and stripped back romantic naivety, not to mention the legendary status of DiCaprio’s Romeo and that shirt. MOULIN ROUGE! On its release, Moulin Rouge! invited audiences into the glittering world of fin de siècle Paris, and presented a high-octane vision of Montmartre’s nocturnal world. Though the film’s custom corsetry is the stuff of fantasy, feathers, lace and long gloves plucked from the boudoir instil a seductive effervescence in today’s wardrobe – as seen on the runways once more. THE GREAT GATSBY For the lavish Gatsby, Luhrmann and costume designer Catherine Martin reimagined the exuberant clothes of the 1920s, reflecting the era’s liberation. In…

So, do you want to be my therapist, or shall we just talk?” It’s late at night and Baz Luhrmann has had to cut short filming on the Gold Coast due to the flooding rain. His crew is scrambling to fly out to LA in the morning and it’s a drama because the film director is close to wrapping his biopic, Elvis. Luhrmann and wife Catherine Martin, the four-time Oscar-winning costume designer, have also been looking back over the Vogue archives. The duo first guest-edited the magazine in 1994, so there is great nostalgia attached to the project, but as it turns out Luhrmann is not one to indulge in sentimentality. We are pushing him to go there. “I’ve always had an enduring love affair with Vogue, and there are two…