Hello and thank you for downloading this witness podcast with me Rebecca Kespi

and today we look back at the sweeping social changes that came about after the formal

dissolution of the USSR 25 years ago.

After seven decades of living in an enormous federal communist state,

Russians were emerging into a new capitalist country,

and it wasn't just the geographical boundaries that had changed.

The nation was discovering a new identity and I've been speaking to a woman who was determined

that it would be a stylish one.

Alyona Dolielskaya was the first editor-in-chief of Vogue Russia.

A friend of mine, she said, Alleona, there's somebody in town who is looking for an

editor because they're launching Vogue.

I said oh don't be ridiculous they will never launch Vogue in Russia.

So now it looks like the guy is serious would you talk to him and, yeah. And then I had a telephone call and it all started.

In 1998, Alyona Dalyzgaya already had an impressive CV. Having been an academic at the prestigious Moscow State University, after the collapse of the

U.S.S.R, she went into publishing.

She also had a lifelong interest in fashion, but after years of commercial isolation, few Russians had even heard

of Vogue magazine.

From the focus groups and marketing research we've done before, 90% of awareness was that vulgar cigarettes.

Right.

So they had no idea we're talking about probably the most important authoritative

creative magazine title in the whole history of

Blossa magazine industry.

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