Meghan Markle’s public journey has been nothing short of tumultuous ever since she stepped into the spotlight alongside Prince Harry. While the Duchess of Sussex has made headlines for various reasons — from royal departures to her own streaming show With Love, Meghan — recent reports have shed light on a lesser-known controversy involving a magazine cover.
According to sources, Meghan had been slated to feature prominently in the UK edition of Vogue’s September 2022 issue. The plan included extensive editorial coverage surrounding her keynote appearance at the One Young World Summit in Manchester, with features both in print and across digital platforms. However, the story took a surprising turn when it was revealed that Meghan was removed from the coveted cover.
Initially, the cover spot was already promised to supermodel Linda Evangelista, creating a scheduling conflict. Meghan reportedly pulled out of the project, leading to a fallout with Edward Enninful, then-editor of British Vogue. But Page Six recently uncovered that this wasn’t the whole story. Sources claim Meghan had much bigger ambitions — she wanted not only the UK cover but also to simultaneously grace the cover of US Vogue, demanding what insiders describe as unprecedented creative control.
“Meghan asked for control over [the] photographer, writer, final edit, photos, cover lines, and wanted a global issue,” said a source. “Nobody gets that. Not even Beyoncé,” they said. The situation reportedly escalated to the point where Meghan arranged a personal Zoom call with US Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour to pitch her idea. However, the response was reportedly cold.
“Anna wasn’t interested,” the source said, noting that US Vogue had already booked Serena Williams as their cover star for the same issue. “Meghan asked for a Zoom with her to reconsider, and Anna did it to be polite.”
But there’s more
Despite these claims, some rumours refuted the idea that Meghan had actively sought a cover from Vogue in the first place, suggesting instead that the magazine had approached her multiple times following her wedding to Prince Harry.
Relations between Meghan’s team and Edward Enninful reportedly soured over the course of the negotiations. “The duchess and her team had high expectations and were expecting she might get a print cover or at least a digital cover out of it, but Enninful was not able to meet those expectations. He already had a magazine cover in the bag for that month,” said the source.