One cutting new accent adopted by leading woman (8)
I believe the answer is:
engraver
'one cutting' is the definition.
(an engraver engraves or cuts)
'new accent adopted by leading woman' is the wordplay.
'new' becomes 'n' (common abbreviation eg NT for New Testament).
'accent' becomes 'grave' (grave is a kind of accent).
'adopted by' is an insertion indicator (I've seen this in other clues).
'leading woman' becomes 'ER' (short for Elizabeth Regina ie Queen Elizabeth).
'n'+'grave'='ngrave'
'ngrave' inserted into 'er' is 'ENGRAVER'.
(Other definitions for engraver that I've seen before include "One who cuts or incises" , "Design cutter" , "Etcher" , "Artist working on stone etc" , "who produces incisive letters" .)