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| Hi, welcome to Line Sheet. I’ve got one more night out and then I’m out-out for a week. (Don’t worry, you won’t even notice. I’ll be back faster than it takes for J.D. Vance to wipe off his eyeliner.)
Last night, I dipped into D.T.C. land, finally meeting D.S. & Durga founders Kavi and David Moltz and Soft Services’ Rebecca Zhou at a dinner in the The Oaks celebrating their buffing-bar collaboration. What a night. The writer Melissa Magsaysay and I realized we both went to Emerson College, and a bunch of us agreed that it’s important to leave Boston immediately after graduating no matter what. (There’s nothing for you there, I promise.) People smoked and ate pieces of chocolate from a fig-filled heart that was shattered open with a tiny hammer. (Shout-out to chef Gerardo Gonzalez, whose Lower East Side coffee shop El Rey was a favorite of mine during the peak of Bon Appétit’s powers.)
Tonight is the Emily in Paris premiere at the Egyptian Theater. (Better than any fashion show, potentially. At least more novel!) Look for my readout tomorrow, and be sure to say hello if you clock me.
Today, Rachel Strugatz is here with some news: Blake Lively’s haircare brand is already a hit. The online “Blake-lash,” as the kids are calling it, may have actually fueled purchases of Blake Brown at Target and BlakeBrownBeauty.com, which is currently sold out of every SKU. (I was tempted to try the hair mask, but the scent is strong, and I already wear a very heady perfume.) Read on to hear how much she sold at Target in the first week, plus lots more intel.
Also, if you’re an executive at a company that Rachel writes about and you haven’t subscribed to Puck, do yourself a favor and organize a group rate with [email protected]. Beauty companies always have budgets for these sorts of minor expenses, and we all know that you rely on Rachel far too heavily not to read her every word.
Mentioned in this issue: Blake Lively, Blake Brown, Roger Lynch, Condé Nast, Kim Kardashian, Emily in Paris, Hayley Romer, Ryan Reynolds, NYFW, Give Back Beauty, Jessica Testa, Peter Do, Stefano Pilati, Britney Spears, Proenza Schouler, Ralph Lauren, Alaïa, Helmut Lang, and many more…
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| A MESSAGE FROM OUR SPONSOR |
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| For your awards consideration Max presents: The Emmy® Award Nominated HBO Original Series True Detective: Night Country – When the long winter night falls in Ennis, Alaska, the eight men who operate the Tsalal Arctic Research Station vanish without a trace. To solve the case, Detectives Liz Danvers (Jodie Foster) and Evangeline Navarro (Kali Reis) will have to confront the darkness they carry in themselves and dig into the haunted truths that lie buried under the eternal ice. Don’t miss the series Rolling Stone calls “THRILLING & GRIPPING.” Now streaming on Max |
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- The future of Condé Nast’s… sales department: In case you were wondering, chief revenue officer Pam Drucker Mann really did leave in early August, and C.E.O. Roger Lynch, who is currently enjoying himself in Montauk (look left), told the sales team he’ll replace her by the end of the third quarter. A few weeks ago, some new names popped up in the candidate pool, including Art Basel’s chief growth officer and former Atlantic Media C.R.O. Hayley Romer. More to come on Condé this fall as people get back from their holidays.P.S.: A certain magazine editor would love for me to round up the best salespeople working in fashion publishing today, so if you know someone who is doing a great job and not getting paid enough, send their name my way and I’ll position them to get poached.
- The New York Fashion Week calendar is filling up: Just as Jessica Testa and I began discussing the state of the shows during a recent recording of Fashion People, two more invites appeared in my inbox: Rachel Antonoff x Susan Alexandra on September 6 and Nanushka on September 7. Per usual, what felt like a barren week is turning into a crammed one, with designers front-loading the calendar—many showing before Fashion Week officially starts. (Proenza Schouler is September 4, Ralph Lauren is September 5, and Alaïa is September 6.) The names off the calendar are notable. Joseph Altuzarra, a fixture, is getting ready to welcome a child. Helmut Lang, which brought on Peter Do just a year ago, is opting out, too. (Do’s first two collections were panned, although I suspect that’s not the reason he’s not showing.) Gabriela Hearst is trying Paris.The Council of Fashion Designers of America has done a good job of wooing international names this time around—Alaïa in particular is a giant deal, but Off-White, Toteme, and Nanushka mean something, too. As I said to Jess, I’m not sure New York Fashion Week is in crisis, and the return of Calvin Klein next February should give it additional weight. (Creative director Veronica Leoni has a very good reputation internationally. It’s a big deal they got her.)
Do I think it would feel more cohesive if Proenza or Ralph opened every season and Marc Jacobs closed? Sure. But Marc Jacobs is happy doing his own thing, and I encourage all of you to look at New York Fashion Week not as good or bad, but simply as existing. It’s not going away, but it’s never going to be Paris, and that’s okay. At least we were able to rid ourselves of the tedious centralized venues of the recent past. Let’s enjoy it—I’ve got that back-to-school feeling in the pit of my stomach already.
- On the subject of Jess Testa: She is leaving the New York Times Styles desk. (No, she did not tell me, and I apologize for making this awkward for her, but I just always seem to find stuff out. A rep for the Times did not respond to a request for comment.) According to an email I viewed, she’s moving to a different, but adjacent, beat at the paper. Jess held the coveted second-chair position on the fashion team, a specialized pod within the greater Styles ecosystem, and I’ll especially miss her profiles of women. (Some bangers include takes on Staud and Tory Burch, but also the story of how Balenciaga ended up on The Simpsons.)As for who may replace her, I’d venture to say that we shouldn’t expect a one-to-one scenario. (Which is why I’m not listing out the obvious names here.) This is a headcount, which signals a new opportunity. The world has changed quite a bit since Jess started writing about fashion just five years ago, and who knows what kind of writer, with what kind of focus, will land there next. Best of luck to Jess, I’ll miss her constant coverage! In other Styles desk news, longtime reporter Ruth La Ferla recently left. Ruth was the kind of contributor you call an “institution”—she always had the best angle. By the way, if you’re a journo and you think you can bring something new and different to that situation, you should apply!
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| Now, here’s Rachel with the low-down on Blake Brown… |
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| Half-Blaked |
| Blake Lively is having a moment, and now she’s got a haircare line to prove it. Is the early success of Blake Brown the result of her goofy authenticity, a genius marketing instinct, or both? |
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| It’s been a busy few weeks for Blake Lively, who has been promoting her new movie, It Ends With Us, in looks that can only be described as elaborate and effortlessly troll-ish. This is performance art at its finest, and Lively is a master at her craft, from the gaudy sequin flowers to that sparkly floral Versace gown Britney Spears wore more than 20 years ago. (Lively’s character in the movie, Lily, owns a flower shop called Lily Blooms.) And then, in the midst of a press tour and rumors of a maybe feud with co-star and director Justin Baldoni, she decided to release a beauty brand.Blake Brown, a line of affordable haircare products in questionable metallic, honeycomb-shaped packaging, debuted at Target on July 31. The branding, logo, etcetera, isn’t great, but the consensus is that Lively did a lot of other things right. She’s known for her hair—and made her own look ostensibly accessible with some shampoo and hair masks that mostly cost less than $20. The reality is that this venture will probably do quite well. “She knows what her girl wants to see and it’s not conventionally chic,” an investor in one of the biggest celebrity brands said of Lively. |
| A MESSAGE FROM OUR SPONSOR |
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| For your awards consideration Max presents: The Emmy® Award Nominated HBO Original Series True Detective: Night Country – When the long winter night falls in Ennis, Alaska, the eight men who operate the Tsalal Arctic Research Station vanish without a trace. To solve the case, Detectives Liz Danvers (Jodie Foster) and Evangeline Navarro (Kali Reis) will have to confront the darkness they carry in themselves and dig into the haunted truths that lie buried under the eternal ice. Don’t miss the series Rolling Stone calls “THRILLING & GRIPPING.” Now streaming on Max |
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| While WWD recently reported that Lively’s line “generated $16 million in media impact value within one week,” that’s basically a B.S. metric provided by a P.R. person. But a source close to Target told me that the brand had over $1 million in sales in its first week, which is impressive given the products’ modest price tag. “When Target gets behind something like this, it’s going to work in the beginning no matter what because of the placement they give it,” this person said. “Target is pushing it at the highest level, so it’s going to come out of the gate hot. But will it sustain?” (Anecdotally, Gloss Angeles podcaster and pop culture expert Kirbie Johnson told me, “We had so many listeners say they ran to Target to get the products, which was not the case with Fenty or Cécred.”)Packaging aside, Blake Brown has the right mix of category fit, price, and distribution. It’s approachable, which fits with Lively’s Instagrammable persona: She doesn’t use a stylist, posts corny social media captions, talks to followers like friends, but also makes sure to maintain peak V.I.P. exposure, like cheering arm-in-arm with Taylor Swift at the Super Bowl, and then telling the media it was the first time she’d been apart from her four kids in ages. Lively appears real, for a celebrity at least, and people find that charming. Also, Lively’s partner in her new endeavor is the estimable Give Back Beauty, the Italian manufacturer and incubator behind Millie Bobby Brown’s Florence by Mills. Give Back Beauty also makes fragrances for Zegna and Tommy Hilfiger. (Interestingly, both licenses were once held by The Estée Lauder Companies.)
Finally, haircare seems to fare better than makeup or skincare within the larger celebrity and influencer machine. (Tracee Ellis Ross, Dani Austin, Negin Mirsalehi, Amber Fillerup Clark, Jennifer Aniston, Beyoncé, Rihanna, Kylie Jenner, and Selena Gomez, are all established players in the market.) Getting good hair is more of an endless pursuit, and consumers are always chasing a solution, or at least that’s how a beauty marketer explained it to me—it’s “more of a moving target,” as this person put it.
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| I don’t want to discount Lively’s marketing power, but she also has a blueprint for brand building in her very own home from husband Ryan Reynolds, who along with Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Kim Kardashian, and George Clooney, is arguably one of the most successful celebrity entrepreneurs of his time. The Deadpool & Wolverine star’s ventures include Aviation Gin, Mint Mobile, Wales-based Wrexham Association Football Club, and Maximum Effort, the marketing and media company he co-founded with business partner George Dewey. Lively, for her part, also recently founded Betty Buzz, a cute soda company. |
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| Still, the most interesting thing about Lively is that no one knows anything about her. Usually, at least one person has worked with the celebrity or influencer in question (or knows someone who has) and can give context, background, dish, whatever. Apart from the designer belt I heard she never returned, Lively is a black box. It’s impressive. “She was never known for her acting, but she became uber-famous and everyone wanted to be her and brands wanted to dress her,” a top beauty marketer said of Lively, who is, in some ways, an original influencer. “People go in a frenzy every time she has a project.” |
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That’s it from Rachel and me. P.S., for those of you off the grid, literally and/or figuratively: Stefano Pilati scrubbed his Instagram feed. Could mean nothing, could mean something!Until tomorrow,
Lauren |
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| FOUR STORIES WE’RE TALKING ABOUT |
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| Zaz Legal Omens |
| A dispatch from the front row of the Venu trial. |
| ERIQ GARDNER |
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