Annie Leibovitz was invited to photograph Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace in 2007. She took four portraits that day—and would photograph the queen a second time, at Windsor Castle in 2016. Here are her memories of her first, historic sitting.
I wanted a straightforward, intelligent portrait. I thought that this would be my only chance to photograph the queen, and I was allotted less than half an hour. They showed me catalogs of her clothes and jewelry and asked me to pick what she would wear. I picked a long gold dress as a base. The rest—the dark cloak that Cecil Beaton photographed her in, and the Order of the Garter robe, and a fur coat—would be layered on top of it and removed for the different pictures.
The queen arrived late, not in a terribly good mood, and was wearing a tiara, which wasn’t in my plan (the tiara was supposed to come later in the shoot). I asked if she could remove it so that the image would be simpler. “Less dressy” was how I put it. “Less dressy!” the queen replied. “What do you think this is?”
This story is from the November 2022 edition of Vogue US.
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This story is from the November 2022 edition of Vogue US.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
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