Cynthia Leive has served as Editor-in-Chief of Glamour magazine since May 2001. Glamour is the most celebrated women’s magazine in America today, having won more than 170 journalism awards. It reaches more than 12 million readers each month, and outsells more than 98% of all magazines on the newsstand.

Under Leive, Glamour has received a record number of editorial awards, including four consecutive National Magazine Award nominations for General Excellence from 2005-2008. In 2005 the magazine won that award (last given to a women’s magazine in 1992), and then in 2007 Glamour won another National Magazine Award for Personal Service.  The magazine has also received three Clarion awards from Women in Communications, four Exceptional Merit Media Awards from the National Women’s Political Caucus, five Front Page Awards from The Newswomen’s Club of New York and the Beth Fonda Award from the American Medical Writers Association, among many others. Leive’s first issue of Glamour won the Folio Editorial Excellence Award. 

Glamour was also named for the first time to both Advertising Age’s “A-List” and Adweek’s “Hot List” in 2005 and 2006 in recognition of the magazine’s strength in circulation, advertising pages, editorial excellence and industry acclaim. Glamour was named again to Adweek’s “Hot List” in 2007 and 2008. Since Leive became editor-in-chief, Glamour’s circulation has risen to its highest levels in history, with a rate base of 2.25 million. In September 2008, Forbes named Leive the “Most Powerful U.S. Fashion Magazine Editor.” Crain’s put Leive on its “Top 40 Under 40” list and she was also named one of Gotham magazine’s most powerful women under 40 in New York. Leive is the author of Glamour’s Big Book of Dos & Don’ts: Fashion Help for Every Woman and Ex-officio of the American Society of Magazine Editors.

Leive’s work has also been recognized outside the media industry. In 2008 she received a White House Project “EPIC” Award for publishing In Search of Hope: The Global Diaries of Mariane Pearl. In 2006 she received a “Matrix” Award from Women in Communications; a “Champion of Choice” Award from NARAL-NY for her continued coverage of women’s health; and, along with Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton and Gloria Steinem, a “Lead Her” Award from Girls Learn International for her activism in bringing Pakistani heroine Mukhtar Mai to the U.S. for the first time. She received the 2005 “New York Success Is Working” Award from Dress for Success; and, the “Celebration of the Power of Women” Award from the NOW Legal Defense Fund. Leive also frequently discusses women’s issues, from fashion to politics, on industry and community panels and regularly appears on Today, Good Morning America, The View and ABC World News Tonight.

Prior to joining Glamour, Leive served as Editor-in-Chief of Self magazine. Under her as editorship, Self’s circulation increased by 11 percent. Before Self, Leive was deputy editor of Glamour, where she worked for 11 years; there, she devised many of the magazine’s highest-rated features, edited and wrote prize-winning stories, and produced the magazine’s annual Women of the Year Awards.