men.style.com

Conde Nast Says Goodbye to Men.Style.com, Hello to GQ.com, Details.com (Ad Age)
“Conde Nast will shut down one of its web-only brands, Men.Style.com, when it gives two of its titles, GQ and Details, their own websites in October.”

September Ad-Page Tallies Plunge (Ad Age)
“Is September now the cruelest month? It may very well be for fashion and beauty titles this year. The final tallies for those crucial issues are emerging — and for almost every one of the titles, results are terrible.”

Retailers to discount through to 2010 (Drapers)
“UK retailers are likely to continue discounting right through to the first half of 2010, according to a report by PricewaterhouseCoopers.”

Designers divided on copyright law (Canada.com)
“A proposed new law that would extend copyright protection to clothing has designers in an uproar and threatens to widen a rift in the American fashion industry.”

Escada plans rights issue rescue (Drapers)
“Escada, the German luxury womenswear group, has launched plans to raise €29 million (£25.1m) in a rights issue in a bid to stave off insolvency.”

Fashion spread, courtesy of Vogue (US)

NEW YORK, United States — Susan Sontag once said “fashion is fashion photography.” She might have added: “and fashion photography is the magazine.”

Indeed, it’s hard to overestimate the importance of magazines to the fashion system. More than the runway, the boutique, the boulevard, or the internet, glossy physical magazines are still the primary place where fashion lives and the most powerful pathway for its transmission.

But in the first few weeks of 2009, the outlook for powerhouse fashion publishers like Condé Nast (which has almost monopolized high-end magazines) looks decidedly grim. In response to the recession, advertisers are slashing their marketing spend.

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Michael Kors Spring/Summer 2009, courtesy of Michael Kors

Michael, Macro (Fashion Week Daily)
The Michael Kors brand just keeps on growing as it plans to open 25 stores in Europe in the next three years.

Are The Glossies Losing Their Lustre? (JC Report)
“By continuing to focus on the highest of fashion, are magazines alienating a readership for which luxury is an aspiration more out of reach than ever?,” asks the JC Report.

Retailers Still Expanding in China (WSJ)
Even though data suggests a “slackening” of sales, retailers such as Wal-Mart, Tesco are expanding in China. (Subscription required)

Recession’s Impact on New York Fashion Week (WSJ)
Affected by the recession, three designers are combining a runway show during New York Fashion Week.

Image courtesy of Fashion156.com

LONDON, United Kingdom - While taking a whirl around the Internet these days you’re bound to bump into an online fashion magazine – or ten. Everyone from Richard Mortimer of Boombox fame to Net-a-Porter’s Natalie Massenet is getting in on the action – and looking for ways to monetise it.

For a long time, content developers had a hard time creating a distinction between simple websites and bonafide online magazines. But, in the past year, a plethora of online magazines have emerged with three common threads:

Multimedia:   The new magazines are a veritable multi-media festival. For some content consumers, particularly younger tech-savvy types, a multi-media experience is the only way to capture (and keep) their attention: lots of videos, blogs, and communities.

Integration: The trick here has been to create a truly integrated experience across different channels — for example,  how do you make an offline page really come alive on the Internet? Creating complementary content that can be consumed separately, and together, satisfies even the most demanding multi-tasker.

Convergence:   Style.com meets Neiman Marcus.com. Content companies are integrating commerce models into their sites while commerce companies are creating their own content, and thereby, becoming content destinations in and of themselves. 

To mark the surge of online magazines, we’ve compiled a list of ten of the most interesting concepts to watch:
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