“I had all my editors telling me they’ve lost their deposits, they have no more money, and what should they do? That seemed to me a great opportunity for us to help…It was adorable. It was about the industry helping each other. It was a very small thing, but it felt good. We’re not going Read more →
It’s not exactly a secret that Conde Nast has been a little late to the whole Internet thing. Look no further than the fact that their most famous fashion title–Vogue, in case you weren’t sure–only got a dot com a few years ago. So it makes sense the famed publisher is trying to make up for lost time.
Today Conde Nast launched new social media tool “Social Sidekick.” The in-house developed tool works as an aggregator for most-shared content from W, Style.com, Glamour, Self, Teen Vogue and Lucky. It sounds sort of fancy but all it actually means is that on those sites there will be a window at the bottom of the page, which splashes out popular content from the aforementioned sister sites–basically, it’s an aggregator like any other aggregator on any other site. It’s not a bad idea–especially from the advertising perspective–but it’s certainly not groundbreaking, or as Business Insider says, “It’s nice to look at, but it won’t make a big difference to the bottom line.”
Genderbending Florence Welch On October Vogue Japan: We haven’t even seen all of the September issues yet and vogue Japan is already rolling out its October cover, which is awesome. Karl Lagerfeld shot musician Florence Welch, who looks like Jack White’s long-lost brother with slicked-back hair and red-white-and-black suiting. {Daily Mail}
Alexander Wang is Making Sally Hansen Polish! He’s working with the nail polish megabrand on a line of exclusive colors to debut at his Spring 2012 show. It’s his first foray into beauty and will probably be insanely popular; don’t expect them to sit on shelves for long (if at all). {Style.com}
Details on the Style.com Magazine: According to their website, the print magazine will launch “just days after the last look has left the runway” and will focus on every aspect of the Spring 2012 shows: clothing and trends, but also people, parties and backstage peeks. They’ll post daily updates on Twitter until the launch. {Style.com}
Ascending to atmospheric heights in 95 degree weather sounds nightmarish to most, but when you throw Style.com and Natalie Joos into the mix, horrifying quickly becomes an unlikely source of salvation. Wednesday night, the end-all of fashion resources teamed up with the industry’s hippest casting director to re-launch her style blog, Tales of Endearment, on the roof of The James Hotel. Flanked by free-flowing champagne and panoramic city views, the space was a necessary respite from a hard day’s work of sweating in platform heels and well, any modicum of clothing.
Joined by fashion luminaries and showmen alike, Joos held court in a vintage Jaques Cassia scoured from the racks of nearby vintage shop, Resurrection. “I had an idea to throw a one year anniversary party and thought I should do it with someone,” she said of the event’s early stages. Weeks later Joos found herself in a situation that every fashion-loving fille dreams of– meeting with top members of Style’s editorial team, hashing out plans for a summertime fete. Anniversary plans morphed into a relaunch because Joos “was sick of the layout,” which has changed from conventional to accessibly editorial—reminiscent of another one of our favorite pages.
AdWeek is reporting that Style.com is launching a print spinoff to launch in the fourth quarter–which means it would launch roughly sometime in October, after the spring shows.
We thought it sounded a little April Fools-y–why would Conde Nast, who owns Fairchild Fashion Group, who owns Style.com, branch out with a new print mag? A commenter on the AdWeek story echoed the sentiment, “Please tell me this is an April Fool’s Joke? We have runway magazines…it’s call every edition of VOGUE that exists. Errr..don’t you own Style.com?” But we just received confirmation from a Fairchild Fashion Group spokesperson that the story is 100% true.
The mag is an extension of the brand, the spokesperson tells us, and while it’s a “consumer play” from the mostly trade-focused publishing group, it’s not the sole focus of the new venture, as the AdWeek article suggest.
Excited for North of Madison?
We’ve heard rumblings from multiple sources that Style.com’s reality show might end up airing on the web, rather than television.
Why would Style.com air the series online? Two possible reasons: 1. They haven’t yet found a channel that wants to buy it. 2. They’re positioning the series as a web feature in order to attract more readers to the site on a regular basis.
Style.com’s move to the Fairchild Fashion Group got plenty of attention.
But there’s an elephant in the room yet to be addressed publicly. Fairchild has a strict no-press trips/ no-gifting policy. Will Style.com editors be forced to follow those same rules?
If so, that would mean any work-related trip a Style.com editor or writer takes would have to be paid for by Fairchild. And they wouldn’t be allowed to accept gifts. (Aka swag.) According to one source, “it was such an issue when W was at Fairchild that it was one of the internal reasons why they moved W to Conde.”
Over the past 10 years, Style.com has become the fashion industry’s resource for runway images.
Now, as its sister site Vogue.com expands, the property is switching teams. It was announced this morning that Style.com would leave Conde Nast Digital for the Fairchild Group, which includes WWD, WWD.com, Footwear News, conferences, Fairchild Books and trade shows. (In March, W magazine moved from Fairchild into Conde Nast’s consumer group.)
The switch makes sense for Style. While it’s still sold as a consumer property, the industry uses its fashion show database as a library. What’s more, several of Style’s staffers–including executive editor Nicole Phelps and writer Meenal Mistry–hail from WWD.
Publisher Gina Sanders insists that the properties will not become intertwined, but we see plenty of opportunities for cross-pollination here. It’s doubtful that a pay wall will come into play, but if it did, we do believe users would pay $25 to $50 per year to access the database.
Our question for you: if Style.com does put up a pay wall, would you pony up?
We told you about Style.com’s new reality series last month; now we know more.
The “docu-series” is called North of Madison. Agency Doron Ofir, which cast MTV’s Jersey Shore and Paris Hilton: My New BFF, is looking for “Those between the ages of 21 and 28 who express their love and hate for current trends via any legitimate outlet.” Meaning you’ve got to be a working fashion journalist, blogger, etc. to be considered. Casting will take place the first week of November.
We have a feeling that this show is either going to be amazing or really, really boring. Since Ofir and co. found Snooki, we’re going to bet on the former.
We’ve heard through the grapevine from trusted sources that Style.com is shopping around/developing a reality television series.
Unlike The City–the MTV reality series starring Whitney Port–Style.com is promising potential cast members that they’ll actually work/write for the online fashion site. (In case you’ve been living under a rock without a cable box, Elle magazine “employee” Olivia Palermo doesn’t actually work at the magazine, despite the fact that she’s billed as an “online editor” on The City.)
Whether or not this show will actually get produced, we can’t say. Television is nutty when it comes to pilots and such. A friend who works in the industry explains that “usually, a show gets the go ahead to make a pilot. The pilot is the test episode, and if it does well or is well-received in-house, it gets the go ahead to get made into more episodes (min: 6). Some go straight to series, based on 10 minute ‘treatments.’”
Regardless, we think this is a smart move on Style.com’s part.
We didn’t make it to the Dazed party at Don Hill’s last night (although we heard a bunch of people got arrested, so maybe that’s a good thing), but we did manage to stop by the Creatures of Comfort New York store launch on Mulberry Street and Style.com‘s 10th anniversary bash, which was taking place just a couple of blocks away.
Creatures of Comfort, a Los Angeles-based brick and mortar store, label, and online shopping destination for Rachel Comey and VPL-lovers across the country, is opening up shop in New York. Owner Jade Lai hosted a party in her expansive new space last night, and tons of our favorite designers were there: Tiffany Tuttle, Comey, Peter Jensen, Victoria Bartlett, Daphne Javitch, and plenty more. And of course Lai around, not only touting her new storefront, but also her INCREDIBLE in-house collection, which both Leah and I melted over. It’s gently priced–in the $150-$350 range–and everything is a mix and match of silk cropped blouses, tie-waist dresses, and loose blazers. Most was made from a delicate crepe, with some cotton mixed in. And the color palette? Seafoam, terra cotta, white, periwinkle…everything we want for spring.
After fawning over the clothes, we chatted with our Carroll Gardens contingency–Izzy from RackedNY, Adele from Epaulet, and Jen from Bird. South Brooklyn is the best.
But soon it was time to head to Lafayette for Style.com‘s 10th anniversary party.
Happy birthday, Style.com! The granddaddy of all fashion sites turns 10 this week, and its celebrating with a limited edition run of t-shirts created by ten top designers. We got a sneak peek of the first five tees, made by Lanvin, Alex Wang, Givenchy, Proenza Schouler, and Balmain.
Nicole Phelps, one of our favorite runway show reviewers and executive editor of Style, says that the staff wanted to give the designers “a blank canvas to work with. Plus, people love tees. Ours are a nice, affordable $45 and a portion of the proceeds go to Computers For Youth.” The common denominator? Each designer used the roman numeral X in their work.
We’re partial to Lanvin‘s iteration, mostly because we’re partial to Alber’s sketches. But you know, Proenza‘s isn’t bad either. Nor is Givenchy’s. In reality , they’re all equally fantastic.
Want one of these slouchy stunners for yourself? They’ll be for sale at Style.com’s mobile pop-up shop in Madison Square Park on September 15, on the site September 16. Click through to see the designer’s work.
