Editor who advised Diana on her style
Anna Harvey Fashion journalist BORN SEPTEMBER 12, 1944 DIED OCTOBER 9, 2018, AGED 74
AS PRINCESS Diana’s personal style adviser, Anna Harvey had an unprecedented insight into the inner workings of dressing a royal.
Born Anna Gail Folkard in London she was the daughter of Anthony, an art director, and Sheila, who worked for the National Art Collections Fund.
Harvey spent her childhood in South Africa but moved back to Britain when she was 14.
After leaving Queen Anne’s School in Caversham, Berkshire, she worked as a secretary at an advertising agency before moving to the PR department of Sanderson.
In 1964 Harvey had her first taste of the fashion world when she got a job at Vanity Fair magazine. From there she moved to Harpers & Queen, sharing a desk with current Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour.
Her next career move, which was inspired by a chance meeting with photographer Norman Parkinson, was in 1970 to Brides magazine.
That same year she married lawyer Jonathan Harvey.
In 1977 she moved over to Vogue, part of the Condé Nast publishing house. During her time there, as fashion editor then deputy editor, she spotted new talent, including David Emanuel and Jasper Conran.
However Harvey became best known for her work as Princess Diana’s personal fashion stylist.
First meeting in 1980, when Diana was 19, Harvey was recommended by colleagues to give her a revamp. “We thought we might be able to help with her image,” she said.
A friendship bloomed and Harvey would visit Kensington Palace with a rail of clothes for Diana to browse. “We’d sit on the floor in her drawing room, looking at sketches and swatches of fabric, while the butler brought endless coffee,” she wrote in Vogue, after Diana died in 1997.
Harvey once said that in the beginning Diana’s fashion sense was “incredibly unsophisticated” – she owned just a few Laura Ashley blouses and some bobbly jumpers. “Her taste was typical of her background,” said Harvey, but Diana was open to ideas. “She wanted to be modern rather than fashionable.”
She left Condé Nast after a 40-year career. In 2016 she published Timeless Style: Dressing Well For The Rest Of Your Life.
Harvey, who died from ovarian cancer, is survived by husband Jonathan and four children.