Arts
**Magazeum**

Podcasts about magazines and the people who made (and make) them.

Latest Episodes:

Linda Wells (Editor: Allure, Air Mail Look, Revlon, more) Apr 12, 2024

Show notes

No ‘Visions of Loveliness’

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Picture it: It’s 1991. You’re sitting at your desk at The New York Times, when you get a call from the office of Condé Nast’s Alexander Liberman. Alex wants to meet you for lunch at La Grenouille to discuss an opportunity: Si Newhouse has decided to launch the first-ever beauty magazine, and he thinks you’re just the woman to make it happen. You’re 31 years old. The canvas is blank. The budget is endless. What’s your move, Linda Wells?

For the women’s magazine editors of today, struggling to keep the lights on by juggling Instagram, TikTok, marketing events, digital content, and whatever remains of their print product, this is a tale so far-fetched it feels like the stuff of an early aughts rom-com. But millennial editors’ wildest ideas about the “Town Car Era” of magazine-making were just another day at the office for Linda Wells.

Linda led Allure for 25 years, becoming a front-row fixture at Fashion Week—while also pioneering the cottage industry of backstage beauty coverage—and enlisting writers like Arthur Miller, Isabel Allende, Betty Friedan, and John Updike to write about … beauty.

In 2018, she pivoted, restyling herself as a beauty entrepreneur, launching with Revlon a makeup range she called Flesh. Now she’s back in the land of editorial, having a bunch of fun at the helm of the beauty vertical of Graydon Carter’s Air Mail, commissioning articles on everything from psychedelics to orgasm coaches.

We knew Linda Wells would be delightful, and yet she exceeded our expectations. We know you’ll love her too.

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This episode, a collaboration with The Spread, is made possible by our friends at Mountain Gazette, Commercial Type, and Lane Press.

Caitlin Thompson (Cofounder & Editor, Racquet) Apr 05, 2024

Show notes

STRING THEORY

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Media, and most every brand in general, talks a lot about building and nurturing a community. Tribes, even. Finding one, inserting yourself into it, and then making your message an integral part of it. And what activity creates a more loyal community, than sports? If there is the ultimate niche audience, sports is it. It goes without saying that every sport has fans. And some lend themselves to something beyond fandom; they are lifestyles.

And few magazines have built up a brand around a single sport and its audience and their lifestyle as much as Racquet.

Launched with a Kickstarter campaign in 2016 by Caitlin Thompson, Racquet is a presence at major tennis events and has inserted itself into the lifestyle of tennis fans and players alike. The path has been rocky at times, but Thompson is clear about her aim to provide a “premium experience at a premium price,” as she told the Nieman Lab in an interview in 2017.

Like any other media, Racquet will live and die based on a business plan, and it is quite possible that Racquet magazine is just a small part of a larger creative media agency, all centered around a global community. And while she is not loath to smash some volleys in the direction of the tennis establishment, she is doing this while also trying to recenter the entire community and become its new beating heart.

Caitlin Thompson has much in common with the world’s top tennis players: passion, drive, ambition—and a willingness to make … a racket.

Edel Rodriguez (Illustrator: Time, Mother Jones, Der Spiegel, more) Mar 29, 2024

Show notes

WHAT'S RED AND YELLOW AND ORANGE ALL OVER?

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The images are iconic. And you know who they depict. They may be the most unforgettable magazine covers to emerge from the chaos of the late 2010s. Why are they so effective? Because of the implicit understanding of what’s being said between artist and audience—without a word being spoken. Using just three basic colors, today’s guest has created the brand identity of resistance.

Edel Rodriguez was born in Cuba, and though he left that island nation when he was quite young, arriving in the US during the Mariel boatlift, one can’t help sensing an aesthetic that might be especially Cuban, or can be called, perhaps, “authoritarian-adjacent.” Because when the US flirted with—as it will again this year—a presidential candidate rotten with autocratic tendencies, Rodriguez’s imagery is the perfect match for the moment.

His red, yellow, and orange covers for Time, Mother Jones, and Der Spiegel—25 in all—were minimalist, dangerous, and dead-on-balls accurate. And he joins us today fresh off the premiere of his stunning graphic memoir, Worm: A Cuban American Odyssey.

Of his notorious subject, Rodriguez saw the famously orange skin tone as a “warning sign,” he toldFast Company, and the simple style he employed resonated because it broke through the noise in the most effective way imaginable. Coming from Cuba, Rodriguez feels a duty to express, through his art, the potential outcomes of the choices we have made—and might make yet again. As he toldThe Guardian, “I don’t think most Americans realize what a coup is.”

Of course, Rodriguez is more than just this one subject. But he’d be the first one to admit that he is political, and he makes no pretense of hiding his politics. As for his fans, they tell the artist that his work helps them crystallize their own thoughts and animates their feelings in ways they struggle to express on their own. A picture is worth a thousand words, indeed.

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This episode is made possible by our friends at Mountain Gazette, Commercial Type, and Lane Press.

Kat Craddock (CEO & Editor-in-Chief: Saveur) Mar 22, 2024

Show notes

Saveur was always a little different from the other food magazines. It was not exactly highbrow, but it did expand the definition of what a food magazine could be. If anything, it was a magazine about culture—centered on food, sure—but also about places, and things, and people.

It was a magazine for foodies before the word “foodie” was invented—and then became annoying. It embraced the web and digital. It attracted very smart writers and a dedicated readership (I was one of them). It branched into cookbooks (and I have some).

It was a media company centered around a defined editorial brand and mission. It was also bought and sold quite often—or often enough that each new owner and each new editor that came aboard tried to fix it, somehow, to make the numbers look better, perhaps, and that meant a lot of tinkering.

Of course, this was also a time when our traditional notions of media were being challenged and upended almost daily, so it didn’t really come as a surprise when Saveur announced they would cease publishing their print edition in 2021.

But then, in a move that recalled the famous Remington Razor commercials of the early 80s—“I was so impressed, I bought the company”—a longtime editor of Saveur, Kat Craddock, found some like-minded folk, and bought the company. And the first change she implemented was a return to print.

It’s out right now, and it looks delicious.

John Huey (Editor: Time Inc., Fortune, more) Mar 15, 2024

Show notes

THE LAST EMPEROR

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It might be difficult to remember, at least for our younger listeners, how vast the Time-Life empire was. At its height, during the John Huey dynasty of the late 1990s/early 2000s, the company published over 100 magazines.

Quite a rise from its humble beginning in 1922, when Henry Luce launched Time as the country’s first newsweekly. It was followed shortly by Fortune in 1930, Life in 1936, Sports Illustrated in 1954, and, finally, People in 1974. It was the largest and most prestigious magazine publisher in the world—and those five titles were the bedrock.

In 2006, Huey became the sixth editor-in-chief of Time Inc., overseeing more than 3,000 journalists.

In an interview with New York magazine, Huey described Time Inc as having a “public trust” and perhaps “an importance beyond profitability.” But not even a giant as powerful as Time Inc. was immune to the financial havoc brought about by the new digital age.

Huey retired in 2012, the last emperor of a vastly downsized and damaged empire. “Google sort of sucked all the honey out of our business,” he lamented then. In 2017, after Time was sold to its bitter rival Meredith Corporation, Huey tweeted “RIP, Time Inc. The 95-year run is over.”

Our George Gendron talked to Huey about Fortune’s battles with Forbes—and their pet names for each other, about giving Graydon Carter and Kurt Andersen at Spy a taste of their own medicine, about not hiring Tina Brown, and about what his mother really thought he should’ve done with his life.

Jeremy Leslie (Founder: magCulture) Mar 07, 2024

Show notes

Jeremy Leslie is a magazine person. A lifer. He has had his hands in a diverse group of publications and media, including Time Out, The Guardian, Blitz, and many others.

Since 2006, he has led magCulture, which started out as a research project, became a well respected blog, but now includes a retail outlet in London, a consultancy, events and conferences, and really, anything magazine.

He has written books about editorial design, and magazines, and his talents are sought after by clients the world over. magCulture, however, is more than a mere destination for magazine lovers. It is a resource, and perhaps more than anything, an evangelist for all things magazine. Its existence has been a boon to indie mags the world over.

magCulture continues to produce a vast array of content on all sorts of platforms and channels, and all of them are worth your while. magCulture's battle cry—something they shout from the rooftops—is a simple one, and one that we at Magazeum share: WE LOVE MAGAZINES!

Jeremy is arguably the best person to speak to about the state of the magazine today, and what the future of the magazine might be.

John Korpics (Designer: Esquire, ESPN, Entertainment Weekly, more) Mar 01, 2024

Show notes

MY EFFING CAREER

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When you’re born in a town called Media, your career path is pretty much preordained. It has to be, right?

And when you end up leading the design teams at blue-chip magazine brands at Condé Nast, Hearst, and Time Inc., the prophecy is then fully realized. (Yes, I just watched Dune). But the journey in between is not as cushy as you might imagine.

Since the age of 10, with his mother’s admonition—“you need to have a job”—ringing in his ears, designer John Korpics has found work doing all of the following: he’s bent sheetwork into duct metal, cleaned windows at factories, he was a fitness instructor, he had a paper route. He worked his way through college in food service—cleaning chicken, wiping counters, serving meals.

When you hear the title creative director, you’d be forgiven if your mind painted a picture. You know the type—the thoroughbred who studied at Parsons or SVA, apprenticed under Tibor Kalman or Roger Black, who gets included on some “30 Under 30” list. That’s not John Korpics. He’s worked hard to get where he’s gotten. Korpics will tell you that. He told me that:

“I always felt like I was the Pete Rose of magazine designers. I hustle, I work hard, I crank stuff out. Occasionally I get one and I hit one out of the park, but there are people in this industry that I think are truly giants. And I’ve never quite thought of the work I did in that league, but I am always inspired by them.”

And then, one day, he was 24 and hired to art direct his first magazine. And then another. And another. And like many of us, some of his jobs haven’t worked out. And when that happens, what does Korpics do? He gets himself another job. Like the time he became a Manhattan bike messenger after one particularly messy ending.

“I delivered mops to the 79th Street Boat Basin. I delivered products to Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. I delivered clothes from a studio to Vogue. I delivered a lot of lunches. And I actually really enjoyed it. Although I will say it’s not possible to make a living doing that. On my best day ever, I think I made about $90.”

It takes a special person to survive in the magazine business. Forty years in, Korpics is still at it. He’s focused on the big picture now—brands, systems, pixels—at Harvard Business Review, the 102-year-old publishing wing of the 116-year-old Harvard Business School. Yes, mom, he’s still got a job.

Let’s meet John.

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This episode is made possible by our friends at Mountain Gazette and Commercial Type

Radhika Jones (Editor: Vanity Fair) Feb 23, 2024

Show notes

Introducing our new podcast all about the future of magazines — and the magazines of the future. Check out episode 1, our interview with Vanity Fair editor-in-chief Radhika Jones.

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Radhika Jones was named editor in chief of Vanity Fair in November 2017, the fifth editor in the magazine’s storied history. Her hiring was met with some surprise, and more than a little skepticism. The Guardian called her bookish, as if that’s an insult.

She arrived at Vanity Fair from a path that included stints at The New York Times where she was the editorial director of the book section and Time magazine where she managed the Time 100, as well as The Paris Review, Art Forum, Book Forum, and Grand Street.

Now, more than six years later, Jones sits at the center of a massive media ecosystem that encompasses digital, social, print, video, and experiential platforms. The magazine has been called the curator of American culture, and sits under the flagship of Condé Nast. The good news is the numbers, including print, are not just good, they’re up across all platforms.

We caught up with Jones after she had put Vanity Fair’s flagship Hollywood issue to bed, but before the whirlwind of events that culminates in the very famous party the magazine hosts once the Oscars are done. The Hollywood issue is out today.

Rochelle Udell (Designer & Editor: Self, Vogue, Epicurious, more) Feb 16, 2024

Show notes

THE ULTIMATE HYPHENATE

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Rochelle Udell is many things.

She is all of these things: teacher, ad woman, vice president, founder, wife, creative director, mentor, chair woman, student, marketer, graduate, design director, editor-in-chief, mother, chief talent officer, executive vice president, collector, president, meditator, internet strategist, partner, art director, volunteer, deputy editorial director, artist, retiree, and baker's daughter.

As Walt Whitman would say, “She contains multitudes.”

“As for the titles attached to my name,” she says, “I consider them important only in as much as they help the outside world understand who I am and what I do. My fear is that they often do more to confine rather than define one’s creative possibilities.”

The daughter of Polish and Ukrainian immigrants, Udell began her career as a teacher at Sheepshead Bay High School in Brooklyn, when a chance encounter with Milton Glaser launched her into the thick of New York magazine’s newsroom in the early 1970s where she and a group of women (including our Episode 25 guest, Gloria Steinem) created and launched the legendary Ms. magazine.

After that, Udell, an Art Directors Club Hall-of-Famer, put her talents, her hyphens, and her multitudes to work at the world’s preeminent magazines: Harper’s Bazaar, Vogue, GQ, House & Garden, Esquire, Self, The New Yorker, and fashion brands, FIT, Chico’s, Revlon, and Calvin Klein.

And somewhere in the middle of all that, she was a pioneer of early-days digital media as the founder of Condé Nast Digital and its beloved, OG food blog, Epicurious.

Our editor-at-large, Anne Quito, spoke with Udell about all of it.

Mark Seliger (Photographer: Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair, GQ, more) Feb 09, 2024

Show notes

THE NEW YORK OBSERVER

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“I finally went up to Graydon and I said, ‘Hey, you know, I know you like me. I know you wanted me to be here, but I can also do covers.’”

• • •

That’s today’s guest, Mark Seliger. He’s the same Mark Seliger who, at the moment of this exchange with Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter, had already shot over 180 covers for Rolling Stone, where he was the chief photographer from 1992-2002.

Seliger had been heavily recruited by GQ and Vanity Fair to move to Condé Nast. But, as he learned, the days of being Fred Woodward’s go-to image maker were over. Once again, he was the new guy. And he saw an opportunity to reinvent himself.

Fortunately, reinvention is Seliger’s middle name.

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