LA*SURFPUNK THE MEN'S STORE: CONDE NAST

Showing posts with label CONDE NAST. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 10, 2011

FOLLOWING

Oh, this is good. Real good!!

A Twitter account of sound bites overheard in the elevator of Conde Nasty at 4 Times Square. How delicious!!

We are so following!

Fabulous, darling

Thursday, October 15, 2009

If you enjoyed this post, other posts and enjoy reading LA*SURFPUNK THE MENS STORE--Please take a moment to make a donation to keep this blog alive!!! You can click the donate button at the top right of the page. We thank you!!

Read more of my blog by clicking the title or subject listings on the right.

Email friends of my postings with the EMAIL icon at the bottom of each post.

And as always, feel free to comment.

Member of the Boxxet Network of Blogs, Videos and Photos

Thursday, June 25, 2009

TRAILER FOR "THE SEPTEMBER ISSUE"

All AnnER, All VOGUE, All Documented.

If you are a true fashionisto like moi you will be relishing every savory moment of this film!!

The September Issue is a movie about the force behind VOGUE: Anna Wintour and what it takes to pull together the September issue.

The man hours, the collections, the models, the story meetings, the bookings all folded into a docu-film about fashion's most coveted and reveled issue: September.

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

ANNER ANSWERS

Our favorite actually sits down and does an interview.

Taken from The Cut:

Anna Wintour Addresses Rumors About Leaving Vogue, Michelle Obama, the Recession, and More

5/13/09 at 11:50 AM

Photo: Courtesy of 92Y

In a rare public appearance, Anna Wintour spoke to Jonathan Tisch at the 92nd Street Y last night. Topics included how Vogue stays relevant in the recession and how to look good without spending a lot of money. Fur might not have come up had the members of PETA in the audience not interrupted. "This woman skins animals alive!" they shouted. As they tossed a banner over the balcony and called Wintour a shame, the editor's expression was a mix of polite restraint and Is there no security in this place? Drowning out the sounds of the chant "Fur Shame! Fur Shame!", an audience member yelled, "I love you, Anna!" to booming applause. Wintour looked her hecklers in the eyes and said, "Fur is still a part of fashion, so Vogue will continue to report on it." When 92Y staff removed the animal rights radicals from the room, Wintour joked, "As I was saying, fashion means different things to different people." Read on for some highlights from the discussion, including why Michelle Obama matters and who will land on next month's cover.

You've said it's time to move on from a job when you get too angry. Are you getting to the point where you're thinking about other options?
Well, mostly I'm thinking about the next day. I think that I have the best job in the entire world. To be honest, I don't think I'd be very good at anything else!

How are you keeping Vogue current at this moment?
You have to remember exactly who you are and not panic. I don't think that Vogue should turn intoRecession Weekly. But at the same time, I think that we have to be very aware of what's going on in the world. In terms of our fashion choices ... racks and racks of clothes are wheeled into my office, and we discuss what's going to be in the magazine and what's not. And up until a year ago, we've been very free about the prices of clothes, and I probably didn't delve as deeply as I should have into what things cost. Now I ask the price of every single outfit that comes into the office, and I think a lot of my editors have been quite surprised about what a little sequin dress from an unnamed designer might be, and if it's $25,000, we'll say, ‘Okay, well, not this time.’ So we're looking at that, and at supporting younger designers — like Alexander Wang, Proenza Schouler — that are more price-friendly ... But at the same time, we are who we are. We represent the fashion industry, and we have to show the best in the fashion industry, and that's not going to change.

What went into putting Michelle Obama on the cover?
She emerged during the campaign as this enigmatic and strong woman with such great personal style. I think at the beginning, she had quite a hard time capturing the hearts of America, and it was interesting to all of us to see how that changed ... Mrs. Obama loves fashion. She isn't, like some people in Washington, frightened of it. She believes, as we do at Vogue, that to be an independent, working woman doesn't mean that you have to walk around with a brown paper bag on … We always felt that Washington rather looked down on us or didn't understand us or wasn't quite ready for us, and now we have an administration that supports us.

What is the role of a fashion editor today?
There's so much media coverage on fashion today from all sides. Our job is to really dig through all that and help our readers make choices and explain what we're seeing. Right now, there's almost too much information on fashion — I'm confused!

How do you go about hiring people for Vogue?
I really hire on instinct, and I look for people who are going to disagree with me. I think personalities like André Leon Talley and Hamish Bowles are really important to the magazine. Some people talk about lots of market research, but I've never really believed in that.

What's different about a Vogue reader today compared to one 25 years ago?
Today's reader knows so much more about fashion. It's extraordinary — they're telling us about designers we don't know about. They're online looking at collections as we're walking out of the tents at Bryant Park.

Has there been a democratization of fashion? Can you look good now without spending a lot of money?
Yes, I think that's one of the most wonderful things that's changed in the last five years. When you're seeing designers like Karl Lagerfeld doing collections for H&M and they're being sold out, or any of the very high-profile names that are designing at Target, it's really wonderful that so much more fashion is available to so many more people.

What's the role of department-store directors now?
We work together. Both department stores and Vogue have really struggled with designers' inability to understand global warming. The fact that they think a woman wants to wear triple cashmere and felt, hairy fabric in the middle of June or July – we go in and say, 'Maybe this isn't the smartest idea.'

How is the recession affecting the production of the magazine?
There's no sense at all in the company that we shouldn't invest as much as we can in the product. We're always aware of the numbers — that's nothing new. What is special about working for Condé Nast is that there's never any pressure from the business side for editorial credits or being nice to an advertiser. That's never part of the conversation.

Has retail changed permanently?
I think when things changed so dramatically last fall, some retailers panicked. Obviously, there was much discounting — I think it was too much; nobody knew what the value was anymore. But I think that period's over. We had a meeting with the biggest stores in New York last week — there's no question that they feel that time has passed. But they bought much more carefully.

How is New York for fashion shows now?
There's a sense that we have too many shows right now. Bryant Park had run its course. They didn't want us anymore. The space was proving way too small. A move to Lincoln Center is going to be very energizing for the fashion community.

Was "Models As Muses" an appropriate theme [for the Costume Institute's new exhibit and Met Gala] this year?
I think this year's theme was particularly important, because the whole world is kind of in celebrity overload, and certainly in terms of what we see in the world of fashion. So I think to take people back in history and really look at the influence of models on designers and popular culture was really an interesting analysis.

Anna's first Vogue cover.

So will we be seeing more models and less celebrities on the cover of Vogue?
Well, tomorrow is another day. We'll never know. But we certainly do have a model tied to the next issue, yes.

Is there someone you'd like to invite to your next dinner party?
I'd like to spend more time with Ambassador [Susan] Rice. She seems like such an extraordinary woman with a wonderful and difficult job.

If you could pick one cover or one face that describes Vogue, what or who would it be?
I have very fond memories of my first cover of Vogue, which was a girl named Michaela Berçu wearing aChristian Lacroix couture T-shirt and Guess blue jeans. And I remember that cover with great promise, because I feel that it meant something's changing, something's different. My first cover is my favorite cover.

For more, check out our Tweets from last night's talk.

By: Mike VilenskyFILED UNDER: WINTOUR WONDERLAND, ALEXANDER WANG, ANNA WINTOUR, CHRISTIAN LACROIX,DESIGNERS, DIFFUSION LINES, HM, INDUSTRY PLAYERS, KARL LAGERFELD, MICHELLE OBAMA, PROENZA SCHOULER, SUSAN RICE, VOGUE

Wednesday, May 6, 2009

ANNA WINTOUR RECESSION PROOF? NOT!!!

It's NO SECRET that Conde Nast has chopped their budget.

The publishing empire shuttered Portfolio magazine.

Town cars are only available to the upper stratospheric CN crust, i.e. Newhouse.

Yet, Graydon Carter's expense account seems to be salvaged--that's another posting.....

But look who is left out in the CASH FLOW COLD:

AnnER (say it British, zahlinks) Wintour.

No Town Car TLC for the EIC.

Find your muse AnnER baby----

Good thing she's wearin--those boots are made for walkin ***cue music***

You keep saying you've got something for me.
something you call love, but confess.
You've been messin' where you shouldn't have been a messin'
and now someone else is gettin' all your best.

These boots are made for walking, and that's just what they'll do
one of these days these boots are gonna walk all over you.

You keep lying, when you oughta be truthin'
and you keep losin' when you oughta not bet.
You keep samin' when you oughta be changin'.
Now what's right is right, but you ain't been right yet.

These boots are made for walking, and that's just what they'll do
one of these days these boots are gonna walk all over you.

You keep playin' where you shouldn't be playin
and you keep thinkin' that you´ll never get burnt.
Ha! I just found me a brand new box of matches yeah
and what he know you ain't HAD time to learn.

Are you ready boots? Start walkin'!

Monday, April 13, 2009

ZACKY POOH GLOSSES GQ : EASY BREEZY COVERBOI

work ( supermodel... )
you better work it, girl ( ...of the world )
wet your lips and make love to the camera

work, turn to the left
work, now turn to the right
work, sashay shante

it don’t matter what you wear
they’re checkin’ out your savior faire
and it don’t matter what you do
cause everything looks good on you ...supermodel

ZaGAYsia brings his dewy freshness to GQ May 2009.

And when we say dewy, we mean: he makes us cream our little manties.

HELLS BELLS-WHAT A RELIEF!! NO HACKTRESS SNATCH FOR A COVER

Thank you AnnER, say it British zahlinks.....

A proper cover for Vogue.... ACTUAL models, who would have thunk!!!

No Drunk Bore-us-some-more, No Fishstick Foultroll, No Clownface HitbyaSPOON.....

We'll actually read this month's ish and not

throw it in the trash bin like we did last month with that fake lipsynch BE-YOTCH----

that thing should have been thrown in a trash bin before birth!!

UPDATE: Don't get too excited about these new covers.... we have just learned that THAT Sluttyienna Miller may be July's cover---

iiiiiiiiiiiiiiicccccccccccccckkkkkkkkkkk!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Monday, February 16, 2009

FRONT ROW FIGHT

As the economy spirals downward, let's not forget the SHALLOWNESS of NYC's Fashion Week and where you are in the seating pecking order at the shows.

Below the EICS of Conde Nast Vogue franchise....... rumors circling that AnnER may be replaced by Carine....

Illustration by AleXsandro Palombo

Tuesday, October 14, 2008

VOGUE'S MISTAKES OF THE PAST YEAR SO FAR

One of the criteria to make a Vogue cover is you may be divorced at least once......

Oh but that's right, you're divorced too, aren't you Anna?.......

These skanks are not cover worthy nor role models!!

OMG--NO, NO NO!!! IT'S CLOWNFACE!!!

Anner...Anner (say it British, zahlinks) what the FUCK are you thinking--- no wonder your ad pages are spiraling down.

No wonder Gawker and City File are questioning your EIC status and job security!!

And.. no wonder everyone is interested in Vogue Russia and Vogue Paris even more.

How many doofus covers does this make this year???

Why would anyone want to look up to a skank who is divorced, a career that was cemented by playing a vacuous, shallow, clothes grubbing vapid DULLARD, and who is trolloping around Europe and LA unwed and shacking up with a man for its kids to see in plain view.

We won't even mention her garish red lips that SHE painted on with her CLOWN make-up kit.

Vogue is turning into the next OK! and Hello! trash slit mag.

Anner--you want ad pages up and circulation up may I suggest:

Rachel Maddow

Portia de Rossi-DeGenerous

Linda Evangelista

Christy Turlington

Tina Fey

We could go on and on and be here all day....

call me, really sweetie--

YOU NEED TO!!

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

THE RUSSIANS ARE COMING, THE RUSSIANS ARE COMING

HIGH PROFILE Aliona Doletskaya at Diane Von Furstenberg’s show and at the Hotel Gansevoort.

Do you think that Anna Wintour's feelings (she has them, right?) are hurt by the media's insistence on paying attention to other countries' Vogue editors, and even speculating that they might replace her?

The other day this adoring profile of Paris Vogue's Carine Roitfeld (Julia's mom) called the rumors that she might replace Anna "delicious," and today the Times introduces us to Carine's friend Aliona Doletskaya.

The "focused and formidably confident" editor of Russian Vogue, who has, of course, a "lithe physique, foxlike features and predilection for curve-skimming dresses," is also rumored to a contender for the US job.

While Doletskaya dismisses this as "fantasy," it could kick off a fun trend to replace the craze for British magazine editors: Instead of Joannas, Tinas, and Glendas, we could have Svetlanas, Olgas, and Natassias!

Let's face it, it's going to happen anyway by around 2011, when the Russians will own everything in New York and the rest of the planet.

[city file]

Here's the NYT profile of Aliona:

Why the Editor of Russian Vogue Is Getting So Much Attention

By RUTH LA FERLA
Fishing in her outsize tote, Aliona Doletskaya pulled out her iPhone. “Yes darling, fine darling, everything will go as planned,” she told her caller with the steely authority of a woman long accustomed to having her edicts followed.

In that instant she seemed a creature straight out of central casting, the lanky Slavic counterpart to Miranda Priestly of “The Devil Wears Prada.”

She is that — to a point, Ms. Doletskaya allowed. This is, after all, her 10th year as the editor of Russian Vogue, an experience, she added in a sexy whiskey tenor, that has not done much to soften her. “Fashion is a world in which everything is gorgeous, stunning, caramel on top of caramel, and cream on top of that,” she said. “But in reality you have to fire people, to say things that are not particularly nice. There is a contrast between what you do socially and what happens behind closed doors.”

Focused and formidably confident, Ms. Doletskaya, who has flitted in and out of the tents during Fashion Week, has been compared to her editorial counterparts at Vogue in Paris and New York. And her somewhat austere presence has fueled blog twittering that she is on a short list of likely successors to American Vogue editor Anna Wintour, should Ms. Wintour one day shrug off the mantle.

Lately those comparisons have placed Ms. Doletskaya under unaccustomed scrutiny. They arise in part from her impressive track record. Russian Vogue, introduced 10 years ago in a time of economic turmoil, now has a circulation estimated at 200,000. Its September issue carried some 340 pages of advertising.

Then there is her image. With her lithe physique, foxlike features and predilection for curve-skimming dresses, she appears to be cut from much the same cloth as Carine Roitfeld, the editor of Paris Vogue, whom she counts as a friend.

Seated front row center at the Diane Von Furstenberg show on Sunday, she studied the collection with an analytic eye, confiding in a whisper: “I love all the safari variations and the big tank tops. They are quite cool.” Ignoring several heads that turned in her direction, she went on blithely, “On the whole, the collection made me feel I was on holiday.”

Earlier that weekend, kicking off her Narciso platforms and resting her feet on a table at the Hotel Gansevoort, Ms. Doletskaya seemed to take the unaccustomed attention in stride. The rumors that she would one day replace Ms. Wintour are “pure fantasy, just that — someone else’s romantic notion.” And yet, in her own assessment, she is infinitely “adaptable,” so much so that one could imagine her stepping into Ms. Wintour’s towering boots.

As an editor, Ms. Doletskaya treads a fine line, hewing to the commercial demands of what is arguably the world’s most influential fashion franchise and, at the same time, catering to the tastes of her Russian readership.

An unlikely style maven, she holds a Ph.D. in comparative linguistics. And she strives to edit a magazine that reflects all that has historically defined the Russian style. The fashion pages in her September issue open with a portrait of Anna Selezneva, one of Russia’s most-sought-after models, photographed to resemble an icon — the religious kind.

That image is meant to reflect “the Byzantine past of the country,” Ms. Doletskaya said, “which, with its love of gilding, is really over he top.”

Yet in Moscow, where Vogue has its offices, tastes are shifting, as reflected by the stepped-up presence of American designers in her magazine. “The full-on extravagance, the red lipstick, the diamonds, the furs, all that is passé,” she said firmly. “The Russians are getting far more sophisticated.”

Ms. Doletskaya herself is intent on fostering those newly cosmopolitan tendencies. “What I want to say now to my readers is that we are part of the world,” she said, “no longer wild unfriendly creatures sitting behind a wall.”

If you enjoyed this post, other posts and enjoy reading LA*SURFPUNK THE MENS STORE--Please take a moment to make a donation to keep this blog alive!!! You can click the donate button at the top right of the page. We thank you!!

Read more of my blog by clicking the title or subject listings on the right.

Email friends of my postings with the EMAIL icon at the bottom of each post.

And as always, feel free to comment.

Member of the Boxxet Network of Blogs, Videos and Photos

Monday, August 25, 2008

COVER LIES: WHAT IS A PENNY AND WHY PINCH IT??

Oh, Vogue! You never fail to charm us with your weird-ass photo shoots and your ridiculous lifestyle pieces. This month, we learned that socialites are limiting their gala events and instead preparing tuna steaks together at their palatial country estates. Vogue has recession-beating ideas for the rest of us too. Is that Cartier watch looking a little dated? Don't buy a whole new one (spend that money on "a strict, limited uniform" of Prada and Chanel). Instead, jazz it up with a new band! Our take on Vogue's multifaceted wisdom.

[jezebel]

If you enjoyed this post, other posts and enjoy reading LA*SURFPUNK THE MENS STORE--Please take a moment to make a donation to keep this blog alive!!! You can click the donate button at the top right of the page. We thank you!!

Read more of my blog by clicking the title or subject listings on the right.

Email friends of my postings with the EMAIL icon at the bottom of each post.

And as always, feel free to comment.

Member of the Boxxet Network of Blogs, Videos and Photos

Friday, August 22, 2008

VOGUE HOMMES JAPAN ISSUE 1

The first issue of VOGUE HOMMES JAPAN COMES OUT SEPT. 10. 2008 . PHOTO HEDI SLIMANE . FASHION DIRECTOR NICOLA FORMICHETTI . MODEL Ash Stymest

If you enjoyed this post, other posts and enjoy reading LA*SURFPUNK THE MENS STORE--Please take a moment to make a donation to keep this blog alive!!! You can click the donate button at the top right of the page. We thank you!!

Read more of my blog by clicking the title or subject listings on the right.

Email friends of my postings with the EMAIL icon at the bottom of each post.

And as always, feel free to comment.

Member of the Boxxet Network of Blogs, Videos and Photos

Sunday, August 17, 2008

VOGUE IS HAVING YOUR BEST INTEREST

“In putting together these stories, we were always conscious that fashion may not be, in this period of economic and political uncertainty, at the forefront of our readers’ minds. We’ve tried, therefore, to edit the collection with value for money in mind-”

From VOGUE September 2008, "letter from the editor."

(Say it British zahlinks, Anner) Anna Wintour knows that times are tough especially if you travel in the circles of Candy Spelling, who is downsizing to a Century City condo or Martha Stewart who wanted to secure a deal with Wal-Mart to make sure their lower income shoppers can still give her and MSOL some of their hard-earned income.

Ms. Wintour's editing brings you $4,500 J. Mendel dresses, Zac Posen couture gowns, and a Jeff Koons painted boat for only a lucky few....in case you had a spare bank account that needs closing or an extra cash flow from a sale of an estate.

If you enjoyed this post, other posts and enjoy reading LA*SURFPUNK THE MENS STORE--Please take a moment to make a donation to keep this blog alive!!! You can click the donate button at the top right of the page. We thank you!!

Read more of my blog by clicking the title or subject listings on the right.

Email friends of my postings with the EMAIL icon at the bottom of each post.

And as always, feel free to comment.

Member of the Boxxet Network of Blogs, Videos and Photos

Monday, August 11, 2008

THIS BITCH AGAIN??? CONDE NAST: VOGUE SEPTEMBER 2008

Is this cover?? of this ugly stand-by bitch supposed to increase circulation???

How many times have you used this sinking boat wench.

What are you thinking???

This thing was on the cover June 2007, which was the second-lowest seller of that half of the year, a tiny 405,000 copies moved.

God--you've got Gisele.....

you've got Agyness who is primed for a cover...

you have Sasha Pivovarova....

you have Tanya Dziahileva?????

Do I need to go on----

If you wanted a celeb , you could have gone with Chloe Sevigny!!!

I have lots of ideas.....

I would have increased your ad pages 202 pages as well!!!!!!!!!

ELI MANNING COVERS MENS VOGUE : CONDE NAST

Could Eli look any more bored???

Who styled the shoot?? What an elementary school project photo shoot to drape a trench over his uniform. So safe. So cliche!!!!

No wonder ad sales are down with this crappy photo shoot!!!!

Where's Grace Coddington--she should have stepped in to save this shoot.

Why wasn't she sittings editor??

Ms. Coddington would have done something dramatic for fall, since it is a SEPT/OCT issue, and maybe something goth since Halloween is around the corner!!!!!!!!

Thursday, July 24, 2008

SI NEWHOUSE

From Sunday's The New York Times:

July 20, 2008
Can Si Newhouse Keep Condé Nast’s Gloss Going?

By RICHARD PÉREZ-PEÑA
WHEN the wizards at Condé Nast Publications recently marched a pre-press issue of Brides magazine through an in-house review, Si Newhouse, the company’s chairman, wondered aloud whether a few of the letters on the cover were a tad too close together.

As it turned out, they were.

Mr. Newhouse rarely misses a chance to vet his magazines before they go public and, like a shopkeeper unwilling to trust anyone else’s tally, still personally hand-counts ad pages in his magazines and their competitors -- even as Condé has grown from just a handful of publications to 26 in this country alone.

Yet this boss with the exacting eye, who presides over a multibillion-dollar empire built on gloss, style, consumption, fluff and substance, is almost universally described as shy, strikingly ill at ease in conversation, and so unassuming that he rarely draws attention to himself or gives a direct order.

Mr. Newhouse (a k a Samuel I. Newhouse Jr.) defies the image of the media baron driven by love of limelight, political influence or money. But largely because of him, Condé — an arm of his family’s privately held Advance Publications — is unlike any other major publisher.

You might know some of his children: Vogue, The New Yorker, Architectural Digest, Glamour, Vanity Fair, Gourmet, GQ, and Condé Nast Traveler. These titles are a polite way of saying that Condé spends money like no one else in the industry — more on salaries, paper stock, writers, photographers, travel, clothes, parties and just about any other line item imaginable.

Condé also consistently sells more ads than its competitors and at higher prices, though some of its magazines make little or no profit. Even so, spending money to make money, and focusing on premium products to attract readers and advertisers, has clearly worked for more than a decade, though its margins are thin compared with those of its competitors. Condé executives say it generates close to $5 billion in revenue, has operating margins of around 10 percent and profits of about half that. Analysts and bankers say that Advance as a whole, which carries no debt, is worth, conservatively, $15 billion.

But some people inside Condé’s stylish Times Square headquarters, as well as experts outside, wonder whether the company, by choice or necessity, will tighten its belt in the years to come — and risk losing some of its cachet along the way. Analysts point to the economic vise the Internet has already put on newspapers, and question whether the luxury goods market — the cash cow for Condé magazines — will continue to defy gravity.

The most uncomfortable questions involve Mr. Newhouse himself. Though he is, by all accounts, in excellent health and allergic to the idea of retiring, he is 80 years old. Will his successors have his knack for identifying what sells, or his willingness to absorb years of losses on magazines he considers promising?

Mr. Newhouse rarely grants interviews and declined to comment for this article. For the most part, however, Condé executives acknowledge only mild concern about such things as the Internet, shifts in the ad landscape and succession planning.

“Whether the advantages we have now are enough to sustain the existing channel, I don’t know,” says Charles H. Townsend, the chief executive. The future, he says, “certainly will require everyone to take a harder look at profitability.”

“But we are the top-end publisher and it has served us well and I believe it will stand the test,” he adds. “Painting cheap stripes on Condé Nast and saying we’re going to serve up Condé Nast Lite would be a huge mistake.”

OVER three decades, Si Newhouse has built Condé Nast from an elite boutique into one of the largest, most successful American media companies, an upscale arbiter of popular culture from fashion to fiction. Yet he has such a low public profile that he goes unrecognized when he walks his pug, Cicero, along Manhattan streets.

Mr. Newhouse goes to work daily in chinos and an old sweatshirt — a small, quiet grandfather, a man of plain looks, heading an empire that revolves around images of beauty and youth. Anna Wintour, editor in chief of Vogue, refers, laughingly, to “his unique sense of style.”

His father, Samuel I. Newhouse Sr., built a major newspaper chain from scratch that employed many of his relatives, including the two sons, Si and Donald. Donald thrived there, but his more introverted older brother did not.

In 1959, the father paid $5 million for Condé Nast, a company with four magazines in the United States — Vogue, Glamour, House and Garden and Brides. In that rarefied air, Mr. Newhouse found a home, developing an eye for design and talent, and a taste for art.

When Samuel died in 1979, his sons gained control of Advance, and Si began making expensive gambles to expand Condé Nast. The company bought a number of magazines, often at high prices, and introduced what may be the industry’s most impressive roster of successful new products. (He also oversaw another Advance purchase, Random House, for 18 years.)

Not every venture succeeded; new projects like Cargo and Vitals, two shopping magazines, failed, and the company closed venerable titles like House and Garden and Mademoiselle.

Mr. Newhouse poured money into the new magazines and some of the old ones, in a way that would have made other publishing executives blanch. Vanity Fair, bearing the name of a magazine that folded in the 1930s, was introduced in 1983, but did not become profitable until the mid-1990s, and The New Yorker, bought in 1985, lost money for the next 18 years.

Critics pounced on Mr. Newhouse in the early years of that spending spree, deriding Vanity Fair as a highbrow celebrity rag, and treating his purchases of Random House and The New Yorker as assaults on culture itself.

Looking back, Condé executives say that there were some excesses in the direction of flash and pop, but The New Yorker and Vanity Fair are now widely counted among the best magazines in the country. Colleagues say Mr. Newhouse reveres The New Yorker, calling it “The Only.”

Last year, Condé introduced one of its most expensive new titles, Portfolio, its first business magazine, which company executives predict will lose $150 million or more before breaking even in four to five years. It has been roundly derided by critics, but so, too, was Vanity Fair, which was nearly folded in its infancy, or Allure, whose entire first press run was shredded.

“He runs his business more like an old-fashioned proprietor, according to his interests, his tastes, like Henry Luce or Hearst did,” says Reed Phillips III, managing partner of DeSilva+Phillips, an investment banking boutique.

When asked what motivates Mr. Newhouse, people who know him rarely mention power or money. They talk about his devotion to his work, his penchant for arriving at the office before dawn, his intense interest in design details and his curiosity about Hollywood, politics and art.

In discussing people or things, “Si uses the word ‘attractive’ the way other people might use the word ‘spiritual,’ ” says a former senior executive who requested anonymity because he didn’t want Mr. Newhouse to consider him disloyal. “It means to him a sort of roundedness and depth.”

(A striking thing about Condé is that people who leave — even those who departed in frustration or felt that they were mistreated — are reluctant to speak ill of the company or the boss. Whether this reflects fear, respect or a lingering hope of being invited back into the gilded fold, one can only guess.)

More than almost anything else, acquaintances say, Mr. Newhouse delights in the buzz his magazines routinely create. He welcomes controversies, like the recent brouhaha about the Obamas-as-terrorists cover of The New Yorker. What tickles him often challenges convention, often embraces the new or novel, and often sells.

When Mr. Newhouse offers advice on Vogue, “he’s always made the surprising choice rather than the safe choice,” Ms. Wintour says. “He likes the buzz, there’s no question. If you have lunch with a celebrity or political figure, he’s thrilled to hear about it.”

Despite the influence he wields, Mr. Newhouse so defers to his editors and dislikes confrontation that a number of them have said over the years that their first indication of trouble came when he fired them.

In keeping with the family ethos, Mr. Newhouse and his wife, Victoria, an architectural historian, live modestly by billionaire standards. They have an apartment near the United Nations and a house in Bellport, Long Island, rather than the more glamorous enclaves of Fifth Avenue or the Hamptons.

Each home is large, but less opulent than some of its neighbors. Mr. Newhouse’s major personal indulgence is collecting modern art. He also reads broadly, especially nonfiction, and attends the theater and the opera.

His greatest passion is movies — the only topic besides his magazines, his colleagues say, that can make him almost chatty. He recently sent a DVD of the film noir classic “D.O.A.” to some of his editors, eager to discuss it afterward. Graydon Carter, editor in chief of Vanity Fair, says his annual Hollywood issue was the chairman’s idea.

Mr. Newhouse follows politics but, unlike so many media moguls, has no interest in having a political voice. In fact, people who have worked closely with him for years say they have no real idea what his political views are.

He is so shy that several years ago, when the company opened its Frank Gehry-designed cafeteria, a chic forest of undulating glass and titanium panels, he initially wandered about with his lunch tray, reluctant to impose on other diners — or, some employees speculated, he was just unwilling to endure small talk. After a while, it was decided that the table to the right of the registers would henceforth be his.

Today, speculation revolves around how much longer Mr. Newhouse will maintain his desk in the executive suite. In the 1990s, Jonathan Newhouse, a first cousin who runs Condé Nast International in London, was widely seen as the heir apparent.

In this decade, that designation shifted to Steve Newhouse, one of Donald’s sons, who, as chairman of Advance.net, has overseen all of Advance’s Internet operations since the 1990s.

Both ideas are simply wrong, according to Steve Newhouse, Mr. Townsend and some other top executives. Instead of a single heir to Si, they say, a team of people will be running the show.

“Si has set us up with Chuck as C.E.O., Jonathan running the international group, and me running the Internet,” Steve Newhouse says. “I would anticipate that those roles would remain the same.”

“I am not going to be running the magazines,” he adds.

Executives and family members also say that Advance itself will also be run by committee, though who will serve on that committee is unclear.

Although dozens of family members have worked in the company, have owned shares and have tried to make major decisions by consensus, there have been two people in charge for the last three decades: Si and Donald.

Si, the chairman of Advance as well as Condé, heads the magazines. Donald, 79, the president of Advance, runs the newspaper business, which includes Parade magazine, the Sunday newspaper supplement, and a stable of local and regional papers like The Star-Ledger of Newark, The Oregonian of Portland, and The Times-Picayune of New Orleans.

Since the 1970s, cable television has become a third major unit of Advance, headed by a Newhouse cousin, Robert J. Miron. Operating as Bright House Networks, it has 2.4 million subscribers, making it the sixth-largest cable provider in the country.

Under Jonathan Newhouse, Condé’s overseas operation has expanded from three dozen magazines to more than 100 over the last 20 years. Colleagues describe him as an unusually brash member of what continues to be a self-effacing and very private family.

Colleagues also say he is the person who most closely mirrors Si Newhouse’s affinity for magazines and his eye for new products and talent. But they say that Jonathan, 55, who declined to discuss succession matters, is content to stay in London.

CONDÉ is surrounded by whiplash-paced changes that have battered broad swaths of the print publishing world. But, so far, the magazine industry has resisted what ails newspapers.

To be sure, some general-interest magazines — notably newsweeklies — have suffered, but most magazines cater to enthusiasts and are intended to have longer shelf lives than newspapers. They also offer a tactile, portable and visual pleasure that doesn’t always translate well to the computer, for readers or for advertisers.

All of this may hold even truer for Condé’s lush products than for any other magazines.

“You’re going to have to go a long way on the Internet to compete with the way we produce words and images in the magazines,” says Thomas J. Wallace, Condé Nast’s editorial director.

Still, much the same thing was said by newspapers a dozen years ago. And even as they say they have little to fear, Mr. Wallace and many of his colleagues concede that pocket computers, faster downloads, better screens and other innovations could change the balance.

Over the next decade, “I think it’s possible that digital delivery and consumption of magazines will become the norm as the technology improves, and the advantages of paper will diminish,” said Mike Simonton, a senior director at Fitch Ratings and a media analyst.

But not yet.

Industrywide, magazine circulation has held steady in this decade, while ad sales have risen. And the market for luxury products has consistently outpaced the middle and bargain segments.

Condé says its domestic ad revenue rose 46 percent between 2002 and 2007, about 10 percentage points better than the industry as a whole. In the first half this year, as the economy stumbled and the ad market slumped, Condé’s revenue was flat.

Almost half of Condé’s revenue last year was generated overseas, according to several executives.

There have been debates within the company about whether luxury ads can keep outpacing the overall market. Those debates contributed to the creation of somewhat less upscale magazines like Domino and Lucky, but the basic strategy didn’t change.

The luxury approach has worked even better overseas, where Condé has found untapped markets for versions of Vogue, Vanity Fair and other titles. The Italian Vanity Fair, introduced just five years ago, had more than 6,000 ad pages last year — far more than any magazine published in the United States — and more than $100 million in revenue, according to Jonathan Newhouse.

“I think sometimes commentators throw around these assumptions about what is happening to the industry, going the way of newspapers, and I don’t believe it,” he says. Some magazine publishers, he says, are suffering because they “have lost their way a little bit.”

“It’s probably too simplistic to say that upmarket magazines do better than downmarket,” he adds. “I think the distinction really is between products that are good and products that aren’t so good.”

Condé Nast has moved very cautiously onto the Internet, again raising questions about whether it will have to make a strategic shift in the future.

Many of its Web sites are scanty. The company adopted the unusual strategy of embedding some of its biggest magazines into sites built around subject matter, rather than giving them stand-alone sites. Epicurious.com, for instance, includes Gourmet and Bon Appétit, while Style.com is the home of Vogue.

Analysts and competing publishers say that Condé Nast under-uses extremely well-known brands that could draw more Web traffic.

“What we’re not doing is trying to turn those companion sites into large Web destinations,” Steve Newhouse says. “They’re there to support the magazines.”

Still, some executives have argued that the company should invest more online and move faster. One of those was Mitchell B. Fox, a former senior executive at Condé whose concerns about the company’s Internet strategy contributed to his departure earlier this year.

Another facet of Condé that isn’t disappearing but is certainly being reshaped is its famously free-spending ways.

As the company expanded in the 1980s and ’90s, it drew more than its share of outside attention for splashy new products like Vanity Fair, high-priced purchases like The New Yorker and florid personalities like Tina Brown, who defied convention in editing each of those magazines.

Media watchers have delighted in the turf wars, scandals, hirings and departures of bombastic publishing executives and cosseted editors. The seating chart for Condé’s Christmas lunch is parsed each year like a Rosetta Stone, with proximity to Mr. Newhouse a measure of waxing or waning influence.

CONDÉ’S habit of excess has also kept many a gossip columnist busy. This, after all, is the company that used to fly dresses on the Concorde from Paris to New York for fashion shoots, gave executives zero-interest mortgages and collected on them irregularly, and had black cars idling at the curb every day, not just for editors and publishers, but also for their assistants.

Beyond such easily mocked extravagances, the magazines had astronomical operating costs and few controls. There was so little cooperation or consolidation that Condé titles actively competed with one another for ads. Some editors had sketchy budgets, or no budgets at all, and were not always held to them regardless.

Mr. Wallace, Condé’s editorial director, recalls that in 1989, his first year as an editor at Condé Nast Traveler, the magazine’s budget was a single sheet of paper. “Nobody here had M.B.A.’s,” he says. “Nobody knew how to read a spreadsheet.”

There were years under Si Newhouse when Condé Nast merely broke even or operated in the red; it lost a lot of money in the early 1990s, executives say. But Advance could afford it. The newspapers and cable systems generated ample income, and magazines were a smaller part of Advance then.

“This was a company of characters, not of financial substance,” says Mr. Townsend, who joined Condé 14 years ago. “We were making a lot of noise, but not delivering a lot of cha-ching.”

Much has changed since the late 1990s, first under the late Steven T. Florio, who stepped down as chief executive in 2004, then under his successor, Mr. Townsend.

In interviews, top Condé executives all made a point of praising Mr. Newhouse’s business skills and saying that he has set the new financial tone as much as he set the old one — as if they were afraid that he would be portrayed as a one-dimensional magazine savant.

Condé has belatedly consolidated its back-office operations and imposed detailed budgets and financial targets. It also created a new unit, the Condé Nast Media Group, to sell ads across groups of magazines in similar niches (like Vogue, Glamour and Allure, for instance) rather than one title at a time — giving it leverage with advertisers wanting to reach defined clusters of consumers.

Chronic money-losers like Vanity Fair and The New Yorker finally got into the black. In fact, Vanity Fair became one of the company’s most profitable magazines, along with Glamour, Vogue, Architectural Digest, and Condé Nast Traveler.

Many of the outsized personalities of the past have gone, including Mr. Florio, Ms. Brown, the late Alex Liberman, the aristocratic Russian émigré who was the longtime editorial director, and Ron Galotti, the effervescent and confrontational former publisher of GQ, Vanity Fair and Vogue. Coincidentally or not, internal squabbling has simmered.

Some extravagances have been curtailed, but no one in the business disputes that Condé still spends far more money than its competitors. Magazine publishers and editors in chief haul in $400,000 to $2 million in salary and bonuses, current and former executives say, and many executives have clothing allowances in the high five figures.

The magazines still stage elaborate photo shoots; some of them publish expensive, long-form journalism, investigations and fiction. Condé’s journalism routinely snares National Magazine Awards, and the company is home to leading creative talents like Annie Leibovitz and Mario Testino.

Last July, Vanity Fair printed 20 different versions of its cover, a daisy chain of celebrity pairs shot over many months and on multiple continents by Ms. Leibovitz, a project that cost millions. It paid for itself, says the magazine’s editor, Mr. Carter, in increased newsstand sales and buzz.

Mr. Phillips, the investment banker, observed, “I would say if you look across their whole portfolio, Condé Nast does a better job of producing high-quality magazines than anybody else in the industry.” But, he adds, “you really could spend a lot less money on those magazines without affecting quality.”

Top Condé executives say they spend money only with a purpose these days. Mr. Townsend cited a McKinsey consulting report saying that the company could trim expenses by just 2 percent without hurting its products or its bottom line.

Others at Condé, meanwhile, say they’re aware that Mr. Newhouse is still looking over their shoulders.

“I had a picture of a fox hunt, and Si had a question about the saddle we used,” Mr. Carter recalls of a Vanity Fair photo spread. Mr. Newhouse told him that one of the captions inaccurately described the saddle.

With Mr. Newhouse continuing to keep his eye on the details, while quietly tallying his ad pages by hand, no one is expecting him to head for the exits.

“Si is as deeply engaged as ever,” Steve Newhouse says. “And he’ll be around for a long time.”

If you enjoyed this post, other posts and enjoy reading LA*SURFPUNK THE MENS STORE--Please take a moment to make a donation to keep this blog alive!!! You can click the donate button at the top right of the page. We thank you!!

Read more of my blog by clicking the title or subject listings on the right.

Email friends of my postings with the EMAIL icon at the bottom of each post.

And as always, feel free to comment.

Member of the Boxxet Network of Blogs, Videos and Photos

LA*SURFPUNK THE MEN'S STORE

SUPPORT LA*SURFPUNK THE MENS STORE

AD SENSE