Margaret Zhang Leaving Vogue China Is Not A Surprise
For the past two years, I've been keeping an eye on MZ's tenure at Vogue China and (spoiler alert) things haven't been looking great from the start.
Earlier this evening someone (a women rudely pushed her bagpack into my lower back) so to distract myself from her lack of consideration I’ll tell you why MZ leaving Vogue China is expected and only the natural conclusion to her tenure.
In 2021, shortly after the year of the Ox began Margaret Zhang took to instagram to casually announce that she was ‘stoked to announce that’ she would be the new EIC at Vogue China; her caption was also written in 汉子/characters.
Rumors had been floating around fashion twitter for months, with BB being the source of a pre-confirmation. I was SHOCKED! For years MZ had been pivoting her blog towards not just an agency partnering with brands to create work targeted towards a Chinese audience BUT towards film itself.
She had released ‘There’s No Space Left in #C Minor’ in 2017, following it up with a series of short films for brands such as Aussie local ASH as well as Tiffany and Co.
Anyway that’s enough pre-amble - let’s get into the meat of it all.
Trouble Starts Brewing
In 2022, seeing the lack of instagram comments when new Vogue China covers were released, I decided to do some investigative journalism (turning to google) to see if anyone else was as peeved and slightly worried as I was.
- Reddit had nothing useful except for some slight praise for her first issue and the model search that accompanied it.
- The real gold was actually WWD, with reporting on Sophia Liao’s wechat aka 微信 posts around Zhang. TLDR: Liao had been let go from her position within Vogue China; she sued Vogue China in Beijing for unfair termination and was successful in her case.
A few quotes of interest from WWD (I will be paraphrasing so as not to infringe on the article since it is paywalled.)
a) Skill Issues - Conde Nast values the Chinese market BUT (without getting into the weeds about the EOC title with regard to China Pictorial) Zhang, according to Liao, did not have the skillset to communicate with various stakeholders internally and externally.
b) Cultural Competency - Zhang sees China from the lens of someone of the diaspora and does not see China with the understanding and perspective of as someone born and raised there (see cultural iceberg).
c) Money Talks - Liao spoke about how money making ideas she had implemented were being fractured by her successor, and two blind men (Zhang being the second with Li the successor being the first) could not lead each other anywhere profitable.
The Plot Thickens (sort of?)
Curious for more, and uneager to dust off my skills to dive into Weibo (gov’t of China if you are reading this please give me my account back), 微信 or 小红书1 I kept on going with Google.
That frequent Aussie spirit of cutting down tall poppies did not disappoint with the Sydney Morning Herald adding to Liao’s perspective the root of why she doubted Margaret’s abilities. MZ wanted Vogue China to help her fund a film she was working on.
Turns out, in 2019 Liao herself had interviewed Zhang for the job; concluding with this ask that Margaret did not have the emotional intelligence or maturity to editorially direct Vogue China.
Those of us who kept up with MZ at the time knew she’d posted less frequently on her website. Her work with Foreground was occasionally popping up on her feed (they hosted an in person conference); more importantly she had put out two short films and started writing ‘Director’ in her instagram bio.
In fact, the Director would stay in her bio long after she posted her film photo with Anna Wintour on her feed, and updated her profile photos' everywhere to match the ones that Vogue put out with PR announcing her arrival.
****In an article on her tenure in the New York Times (2023) Margaret admitted to the fact that her mandarin, although very fluent, was not colloquial in the sense that she could speak well with the Shanghai grandmothers and was very formal.
Margaret Zhang declared to NYT that she would prove the naysayers wrong. And although her formidable skill, hard-work, talent and dedication had done so in the world of blogging pulling her from a mannequin, to a photographer of campaigns (and separating her from peers like Nicole Warne). It seems that publishing is a whole other ball game where ducking isn’t enough to keep you in the game for a while.
Okay, I’m keen to hear what people think, is there anything I missed? I know I didn’t talk about the whole non-compete clause magazines have with models who cover the major Chinese fashion mags (google Du Juan for more details) but I’m tired and it’s Friday!
I’m going to return and update this with more links and details.
My two cents are that apart from some of the valid criticism above, I always wondered whether Margaret could stand being in the background. Her most recent instagram updates on Vogue China in Film events pushed this once small question to the forefront of my mind.
She was the first photo in her carousel.
Always Writing,
xx
D
Xiaohongshu