Daniela Falcão, from political reporter to boss of Brazilian Vogue

SAO PAULO, Brazil — “If there was a death or a disaster, the editor would always make me go. That was my thing,” explains Daniela Falcão, recalling the eight years she spent working as a reporter for Folha de São Paulo, Brazil’s largest newspaper in circulation at the time. Today, her role in the country’s media landscape couldn’t be more different. As editorial director of Edições Globo Condé Nast, Falcão is more likely to be surrounded by killer heels than real-life killers.

From 2005 until earlier this year Falcão was editor-in-chief of Vogue Brazil, the title she continues to direct in her new role, supervising former deputy Silvia Rogar. But now, she also oversees the other magazines in the joint-venture publishing portfolio, which includes the Brazilian editions of GQ, Casa Vogue and Glamour.

Falcão’s rise from gritty street reporter to the top of the fashion food chain has certainly been exceptional. Deep in conversation, Falcão sounds like the sort of woman who could lead a luxury magazine by pure instinct. Looking the part, however, hasn’t always come so naturally.

“I used to tell her, ‘fix your nails; get your hair done’,” says Donata Meirelles, Vogue Brazil’s style director and one of Falcão’s closest colleagues. Extraordinary though it may be for a woman at the pinnacle of the fashion industry to get such frank advice, it is worth remembering that Falcão’s route to Vogue was by no means ordinary.

Ask veterans of Brazil’s close-knit fashion industry for their thoughts on Falcão and one word that comes up more than most is ‘hurricane’. She is indeed fast, voracious and unstoppable, but with an energy that is more contagious than it is intimidating. Unlike her more prickly counterparts helming other editions of Vogue around the world, Falcão’s more down-to-earth approach is something she probably picked up in her former life.

Covering everything from floods to street crime, Falcão’s early days as a beat reporter made her tough and focused. Passionate about social issues — but mostly looking for the ultimate scoop — she moved from Brasília to one of the most remote areas of northern of Brazil in the late 1990s to investigate public health programmes that never seemed to function.

Early political exposés such as these won her a scholarship to Columbia University in New York, which provided an unintentional introduction to writing about popular culture and style. “While attending Columbia, I was [still] a correspondent for Folha de Sao Paulo, [but I started also covering New York’s] myriad events, from movie premieres with Brad Pitt to a Nine Inch Nails concert review. I did it all.”

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Daniela Falcão, from Political Reporter to Boss of Brazilian Vogue