Babs Simpson

Babs Simpson (born Beatrice Crosby de Menocal; – ) was an American magazine editor. She is best known for her 25-year tenure at ''Vogue'' as a fashion editor.

Biography

The oldest of four children, Simpson was born in 1913 in Beijing (then called Peking), China, to Daniel Ammen de Menocal, a banker from an aristocratic Cuban family, and Beatrice (Crosby) de Menocal, a New York City socialite. The family lived in South America before settling in Boston, Massachusetts.

Simpson married William Simpson in 1935 and moved to Locust Valley, New York; they divorced seven years later. In 1944, two years after moving to Manhattan, Simpson obtained (through a friend) a position at ''Harper's Bazaa''r, working in a photographer's studio. She was then hired to work for the magazine itself, under editor Carmel Snow.

In 1947, she left ''Harper's Bazaar'' to work at ''Vogue'', where she would remain until 1972. As a fashion editor, Simpson covered fashion shows and produced photo shoots. She collaborated with the photographer Irving Penn on many of his iconic images. She styled what would become Marilyn Monroe's final photo shoot, photographed by Bert Stern a month before her death.

After leaving Vogue, Simpson worked at ''House & Garden'' magazine from 1972 until it was shuttered in 1993.

In 2006, at the age of 93, Simpson became the oldest person to be featured in ''Vogue'', when she appeared in its annual Age Issue. In 2012, at age 99, she was featured in ''In Vogue: The Editor's Eye'', an HBO documentary about the fashion editors at ''Vogue''.

Simpson was in a 35-year relationship with art dealer Paul Magriel; they lived in separate apartments in the same Manhattan apartment building throughout their relationship and did not marry. Simpson owned a Paul Lester Weiner-designed modernist home in Amagansett, New York, built for her in 1963. She spent her later years in a retirement community in Rye, New York. She died on January 7, 2019, at the age of 105, in Rye.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Simpson, Babs
1913 births
2019 deaths
Vogue (magazine) people
Fashion editors
American centenarians
Women centenarians
American women editors
American magazine editors
Women magazine editors
People from Beijing
American people of Cuban descent
21st-century American women
American expatriates in China