COMING ATTRACTIONS: When word got out last summer that W magazine had invited a film crew into its offices, the fashion commentariat took to wondering if Stefano Tonchi and company had their own “The September Issue” in store. The answer is: Not quite. The end product of the shoot, a short dubbed “The Remaking of W,” will make its proper debut tonight, but an early viewing made clear that any such comparison would be a stretch. The film clocks in at only about 10 minutes and is more of a promotion for Tonchi’s new-look W than a feature-length documentary. The result makes sense, given the short is the brainchild of publisher Nina Lawrence, who told WWD the film is intended as a star turn for both the new W brand and its editorial architect. “It became obvious very quickly that Stefano was very camera-ready,” Lawrence said of the title’s editor. Over the movie’s brief run time, Tonchi proves equally adept at schmoozing with Amtrak conductors and Sofia Coppola alike, while also explaining his revamp of the book in one-on-ones with the camera. (W commissioned the film from Legs, the production company behind contributor Lynn Hirschberg’s “Screen Test” Web series.)
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“The Remaking of W” will appear online Wednesday as the centerpiece of “Fashion on Film,” a virtual film festival set to run on the magazine’s Web site through Jan. 15. The portal aims to be something of a fashion YouTube. In addition to the in-house effort, “Fashion on Film” will house various short-form films from fashion brands, a spot for user-generated content and a channel curated by art consultant Hervé Mikaeloff. Lawrence said the festival is a “precursor to the look and feel” of a wider relaunch of the site tied to New York Fashion Week in February. “Our digital expression will be images and motion,” Lawrence said of how the new site will distinguish itself from the pack. — Matthew Lynch
AN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVE: Net-a-porter.com is cozying up to the American market, naming Tracy Taylor as its U.S. editor. Based in New York, Taylor will contribute to the global editorial content of the site’s weekly online magazine and represent the U.S. market’s needs. She reports to Claudia Plant, editorial director of Net-a-porter.com in London.
“With the U.S. now being our most rapidly growing market, we felt it was the right time to appoint a dedicated U.S. editor who will be responsible for creating content, contributing ideas and spotting trends that our readers around the world will find exciting but that take the local zeitgeist into consideration,” said Plant. Net-a-porter’s online magazine, which changes content weekly, gets 298,000 unique visitors a month, and 3.3 million page impressions a month, according to a Net-A-Porter spokeswoman.
Most recently, Taylor has been freelancing, and before that spent eight years at Marie Claire, rising to fashion director. Earlier, she worked at Details, DNR, W and WWD.
Elsewhere, Katrina Szish will join ideeli.com, a members-only online shopping site in the U.S., as a fashion and lifestyle contributor. Szish is currently the style contributor for CBS News’ “The Early Show” and a correspondent for TBS’s “Movie & a Makeover.” A former editor of Vogue’s Index, Szish will work with Ideeli’s style and editorial teams to highlight the holiday season’s key lifestyle, fashion and beauty trends. She’ll also serve as the company’s primary broadcast spokeswoman. — Lisa Lockwood