Editor’s Letter: Ukrainian Vogue presents the fall print issue of 2024
The autumn issue of Vogue Ukraine Edition No. 7 is dedicated to visions of the future – scenarios for the development of fashion, culture, society and the nation. The editors analyze how the evolution of technology and new social orientations change fashion and media, and model the future of Ukraine and Ukrainians.
I am writing this letter on a plane somewhere between Warsaw and Paris. Earlier this month our colleagues from Vogue Poland invited me to participate in a summit on fashion business and sustainability. Speakers from Italy, Ghana, Brazil, and Poland were discussing the environmental challenges and technological disruption that affect our industry and the world. From the stage of the auditorium of the Polin Museum together with designer Svitlana Bevza and Maria Gavrilyuk from the multidisciplinary brand Gunia Project we talked about the communicative power of fashion — how collections of dresses and jewellery can play part in cultural diplomacy and become a powerful tool for self-identification. We also spoke about Vogue Ukraine during the war and the stories we tell in the magazine's pages, stories about our past, present, and future. And why that is important.
When this issue comes out in print, it will be our turn to welcome international guests, this time in Kyiv. On October 22 on the stage of Unit.City innovation hub we are hosting Vogue Ukraine fashion and business conference, for the seventh time. This year we will be focusing on the future — what the Ukrainian and international fashion landscape will be like, how technology and social discourse reshape media and retail, what our culture and our country will be like, and how we want to see them.
One of this year's speakers is the economist and Rome club director, Viktor Galasyuk. We invited him to pen a column and share his vision of our country’s future and of its possible economic renaissance. As a spoiler, I want to quote the main thesis of his essay: as we chose the most favourable scenario of the future, it is in our power to put it to life, through action.
In this issue, we collected stories of people who are changing narratives and reshaping the world around them. There is a profile on Bjorn Geldhof, a brilliant art curator who, together with the PinchukArtCentre team he runs, executes powerful international projects that in the language of contemporary art answer the critical question "What is Ukraine and who are Ukrainians?". There is a story on volunteer collectives of young talents who advocate the country's interests in the creative scene of New York, Berlin, Paris and London. And there is a story on a star Ukrainian athlete Yaroslava Maguchih, who‘s just had a triumphant season, breaking the world record in the high jump and bringing home the coveted Olympic gold. In an interview with our editor Anna Zolotariova the athlete admits that her main competition is with herself. And promises us a new series of striking victories and records in the next ten years.
Each of them, in their own way, illustrate professeur Galasyuk's thesis. What the future holds depends on us. So let's build it together.
