Maggie Tabberer, an icon of Australia’s fashion and television scene, has died aged 87.
The two-time Gold Logie winner and former Australian Women’s Weekly fashion editor and supermodel passed away this morning, her daughter, author Amanda Tabberer, said.
“This morning we lost our beautiful mother and Nanna,” she wrote on Instagram.
“She was an icon in every sense of the word and we will miss her dearly… Along with the rest of Australia.
“Rest in peace Nanna. We love you to bits forever.”
Born in 1936 in Adelaide, Tabberer began her career as a model in the late 1950s, and was named Model of the Year in 1960.
A shift to publishing followed in 1963, when she began a long-running fashion column for the Daily Mirror, and a year later she began as a TV panellist on Beauty and the Beast.
In 1970 and 1971 she became the first woman to win back-to-back Gold Logies, taking home the award for Best Female Star two years in a row for her eponymous talk show Maggie.
In addition to a successful public relations career with her own company, Tabberer was also the fashion editor at the Australian Women’s Weekly between 1981 and 1996, launched her own clothing brand, Maggie T, and penned a bestselling autobiography, Maggie, which was published in 1998.
That same year, she was made a Member of the Order of Australia for services to charity and fashion.
Twice she was the subject of a portrait that made the list of Archibald Prize finalists – the first in 1999, the second in 2020, both by artist Paul Newton.
“I’d often thought of approaching her again using the original composition as a starting point for something new,” Newton said of his second artwork.
“So earlier this year, before COVID-19 hit, I got together with Maggie, now in her mid-80s (though just as elegant and beautiful as ever), to work with her again on this new portrait.
“I was again drawn to the simplicity and graphic quality of this sort of composition; her strong presence needing nothing else to support her.”
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In 2015, she came out of retirement to feature on the front cover of Australian Women’s Weekly.
Four years later, she was named a finalist for the Australian Fashion Laureate but missed out on the award – only for winner Laura Brown to dedicate the industry’s highest honour to Tabberer.
