“Anna Wintour is an incredibly talented and creative leader whose influence is beyond measure,” said CEO Bob Sauerberg in a statement tweeted by the company.

“She is integral to the future of our company’s transformation and has agreed to work with me indefinitely in her role as @voguemagazine editor-in-chief and artistic director of Conde Nast.”

Legendary for her glacial demeanour, and for making or breaking designers’ careers at the flick of a manicured talon, 68-year-old Wintour had been at the helm of American Vogue since 1988 and artistic director of Conde Nast since 2013.

The announcement comes one day after The New York Times reported that Vogue’s fashion director and executive fashion editor were leaving staff jobs to become contributing editors.

The magazine’s Los Angeles director was also moving to Conde Nast’s in-house creative agency, the newspaper reported.

The changes come with the magazine empire, which also owns The New Yorker and Vanity Fair, tightening staff overheads, and expected to make $100 million dollars less revenue in 2017 than in 2016, according to the Times.

Rumours had been rife since April that Wintour would leave the American edition of the magazine after the July wedding of her daughter Bee Shaffer at her Long Island estate with the all-important September issue allegedly her last.

Her influence spreads far beyond the world of magazine publishing, seared into popular culture with nicknames such as “Nuclear Wintour” and for turning the annual New York Met Gala into the hottest A-list celebrity party on the planet.

Instantly recognizable by her perfectly coiffed bob and trademark Chanel sunglasses, clamped to her face even in pitch-black fashion shows, she inspired 2006 movie “The Devil Wears Prada” in which Meryl Streep plays a magazine editor.