ELLE US Announces the Appointment of its First Female Creative Director
Image by @henryleutwyler
On May 9, ELLE US Editor-in-Chief and long-time Fashion Tech Forum collaborator and featured speaker, Robbie Myers, announced the magazine has appointed Ruba Abu-Nimah as creative director of the Hearst publication. Abu-Nimah is the first female to sit at the helm of the creative team in the American division of ELLE and will succeed Alex Gonzalez, who was brought into ELLE in 2014.
Abu-Nimah is currently the global creative director at Shiseido, a role she assumed in June 2015. Prior to this, the Parsons School of Design alumni held top-level creative director positions at Bobbi Brown from 2005 until 2013.
“We’re thrilled to have the first female creative director, but that’s not why we are hiring her, her work speaks for itself,” Myers commented, according to a Business of Fashion announcement. Myers went on to cite Abu-Nimah’s aesthetic, saying “I think her taste level is exquisite… very much in the way Elle does, she sees the woman in everything.”
Abu-Nimah is known for her diverse background in the global luxury space and was tasked with facilitating a renovation of Shiseido’s creative direction, executing a new international brand strategy.
Alongside tapping its first female creative director, ELLE US continues to be a leading force in women’s fashion publishing. The magazine has a reach of more than 27 million readers across its digital and print platforms and in 2013 became the first magazine to launch a Google Glass app. Alongside this, the publication was also the first magazine to partner with a tech company in creating a virtual reality fashion experience.
ELLE US Editor-In-Chief, Robbie Myers, spoke at Fashion Tech Forum 2016 on Building an Empowerment Brand. Myers was interviewed by Stephanie Ruhle, Anchor at MSNBC and Co-Anchor of Weekend Today on NBC.
