TEEN TALK: Thirty top fashion bloggers will be front-and-center at WWDMAGIC in February, as the trade show launches a new showcase for the conflux of fashion, the Web, music and art. The bloggers — including Jane Aldridge (Sea of Shoes), Erica Domesek (P.S. I Made This), Colby Jordan (Minnie Muse), Jennifer Margolin (Red Sole Diary), Rebecca Lay and Rene Ogaki (Styluste) — will be part of a new 20,000-square-foot space devoted to the teen and tween market on the Concourse, an elevated section of the main show floor.
Each blogger will report on trends, news and finds at WWDMAGIC on their blogs, while also participating in a series of panel discussions and presentations throughout the three days. WWDMAGIC will aggregate the bloggers’ output on dedicated Tumblr and Whrrl channels.
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“Our juniors and young contemporary business has been growing, and what we discovered is that this age group isn’t just looking at fashion. It’s fashion, music, technology, art and Web sites like Whrrl that are driving trends, and we wanted to create an area that could express that convergence,” said Chris DeMoulin, president of MAGIC International.
Four brands will anchor the area with their sales booths — Levi’s, Jessica Simpson, French Connection and Free People. DJs will spin music while an iPad Art Wall and interactive installations from Whrrl and Moxsie will keep visitors suitably overloaded with information.
— David Lipke
KATE’S PLACE: The first floor of Cosmopolitan editor in chief Kate White’s East 95th Street townhouse is decorated with curios from around the world: paintings with Chinese characters, a zebra-skin rug, a monkey-rimmed bowl carved from a single piece of green stone on top of a baby grand piano. There is also a bookcase filled with international editions of White’s mystery novels and thrillers, books like “Lethally Blond” and “Over Her Dead Body” in Hebrew, Japanese, Chinese, German, Dutch and French.
On Wednesday night, White hosted a cocktail party in honor of The Innocence Project, a nonprofit group that uses DNA testing and other evidence to exonerate wrongly accused prisoners. “Some of the wrongly accused have been accused of rape, and our readers are very interested in that topic,” White said, sitting in a woven-back wooden chair at the rear of her first floor. She wore a black sleeveless ribbed turtleneck and a long red skirt. Guests mingled at the front of the house, while a tuxedoed young man tinkled away at the piano.
Molly Triffin profiled interns from the Innocence Project for the January Cosmopolitan. “They looked like such Cosmo girls,” said White. Why? “Because they were feisty and gutsy and gorgeous and, just, they felt they owned the world.
“You don’t have to be one type of woman,” White continued. “You don’t have to be the studious type or the brainiac. You can be all of those things at the same time.”
Most of the news out of Cosmopolitan recently has been about the magazine’s new international editions (Mongolia, the Middle East). There are now more than 60 Cosmopolitans in 100 countries. “When I first got the job — I was given the job without applying for it — and then I found out we have all these international editions,” White said. “I remember thinking that if we screw this up, it will be against the Geneva Convention.” She lifted her shoulders into a laugh.
White said she keeps in touch with founding editor Helen Gurley Brown. They had coffee two weeks ago. “One of the things she has said to me many times has been thank you for still mentioning her in the magazine and talking about her,” she said. Brown keeps an office on the international floor of the Hearst Tower. “What she did, so few people have done.” White paused. “I’ve been an excellent manager of the DNA, but she created it.”
— Zeke Turner
VERSACE’S NEW MAN: Versace has named Patrick McGregor director of worldwide communications and public relations, overseeing all communications and marketing activities of the group. He takes the post Feb. 2. For the past six years, McGregor has held the position of vice president of p.r. at BCBG Max Azria Group. Prior to that, he was vice president of the fashion division at LaForce and Stevens. McGregor will report to Versace’s chief executive officer, Gian Giacomo Ferraris, and succeeds Tomaso Galli, who covered the role ad interim after Isabelle Clavarino left the company in March.
— Christine Lee