Interview: Sarah Bailey, Elle/Harper's Bazaar (Evening Standard)
By David Rowan
MAKE way, New York - yet another upstart Brit is jetting over to shake up your glossy magazines.
After Tina Brown, Anna Wintour and Mandi Norwood, Sarah Bailey is the latest London editor to be poached in the hope she will deliver that indefinable English magic. But what Manhattan's media elite may not realise about the softly spoken 37-year-old - who leaves Elle next month to join Harper's Bazaar as deputy to the equally British Glenda Bailey - is just how far fashion has taken her. After all, before she discovered Prada and Marc Jacobs, Bailey was just another Leftwing revolutionary selling Socialist Worker.
Such details are not, of course, mentioned in the "mwah-mwah" world of fashion magazines, where Bailey's promotion has been greeted with all the gushing praise familiar to Ab Fab viewers. To Bailey herself, the news is "beyond thrilling"; to Harper's publisher, Valerie Salembier, in a breathless staff email, the appointment "is very big and terrific news for all of us - I told you we'd have a great 2004!" But it is Salembier's brief description of the new deputy's career that suggests a reason for hiring her: "She did some wonderful celebrity stories that became quite famous and endlessly talked about." In a publishing sector increasingly dependent on celebrity cover stars, Sarah Bailey has a contacts book to die for.
In her office, just off Park Lane, she is delighted to chat about her favourite encounters - the Gwyneth Paltrow profile that began inside the actress's wardrobe, or Jennifer Aniston as seen by her best friends. Under Elle's previous editor, Fiona McIntosh, Bailey was made celebrity fixer, with the goal of hooking an A-list star for every cover story. By being immensely flexible and interminably persistent - Cameron Diaz took three years - she gained the publicists' respect, even though she says she never compromised by offering copy or picture approval.
"She's really good at pulling in the celebrities, and sadly that's the most important job nowadays for a magazine editor," says former Elle editor Nicola Jeal.
Her favourite has proved to be Aniston ("catnip for sales"), who has graced the cover three times recently. "She is the pearl of cover stars," she says. "It's a cliché, but I think she really has kept it real.
Her niceness didn't feel like a performance." THERE have, of course, been the "diva histrionics". The worst, she thinks, was Rupert Everett. "I had to stand outside the studio in the rain in Amsterdam for the crime of writing in my notebook while he was being photographed," she recalls. "He couldn't concentrate on giving the camera his best, lying on the floor looking luscious in a leather shirt." Did he apologise? "We had a sort of, 'Oh dear, poor sweetie, kiss-kiss' moment on the sofa, but I'd definitely lost my cool at that point.
The piece I wrote was arched." Then there are the stars who try to keep the borrowed designer clothes. "A fashion sample is the most precious commodity in this industry, and if an actress wants a sample that's a problem, as another magazine is expecting it after you," she says. "On one occasion a young American actress - a brunette - wanted a Dolce & Gabbana item so badly that after it was zipped back in my suitcase, she opened it and put it inside hers. When I confronted her, she said: 'They'll want to give it to me.' It was a horrific moment." Despite some prodding, Bailey's rigorous diplomacy prevents her from naming names. A subsequent examination of her cuttings narrows down the field, but Bailey remains discreet.
She does talk about "quite a moment" with Victoria Beckham.
"She was being photographed with dogs on the set, the light was fading, and Brooklyn was getting worried about the dogs. But Victoria was constantly on the phone to David, who was having issues with the amount of flesh that was to be displayed. It was an all-day shoot, and I don't quite understand why David had to be phoned quite so much. But you use your diplomatic skills." In the end, she did get the requisite flesh on the cover.
Bailey, from Marple, Cheshire, lives in north London with stationery designer Tim Solnick, her partner of nine years, as well as a cat. She became involved with student journalism while at Cambridge University - where she also developed her political credentials, selling copies of Socialist Worker to further the march towards revolution-"Yes, it's true," she admits.
"But I was a bit of a hopeless comrade. I used to sell the paper dressed in vintage 1950s party dresses." Her fashion obsession grew after IPC took her on as a trainee. She wrote for 19, Chat and Just 17, joining Elle in 1996 and taking the editor's chair in March 2002. She counts Marc Jacobs, Dries van Noten and Miuccia Prada as her gurus, and is today wearing a Prada skirt, a John Smedley V-neck sweater, Miu Miu shoes, and a Chanel watch with a green strap.
"This year is going to be all about green," she says. "It's quite wonderful and strange, the crazy synergy of fashion - I love the process." Did she pay for what she is wearing? She stretches her eyes in faux surprise. "What could you be suggesting?" she repl ies mischievously. "People think you spend your day unwrapping boxes and nobody can hear themselves think in the office because of the crinkle of tissue paper. I do buy a lot of clothes."
Does she spend more than, say, £1,000 a month? "It has certainly happened," she replies. "I had a horrific moment when I was in Prada in Milan and my bank phoned me and said my spending was consistent with fraud. Which is a shameful thing for a girl to admit."
ALTHOUGH circulation has fallen a couple of thousand during her tenure to around 200,000, Bailey sees Elle's improved fashion coverage as her main achievement. Fashion and shopping, she says, are "where it's at", and she believes Britain is ripe for a catalogue-style magazine that can emulate the success of Lucky in the States.
As for her own move in the other direction, what advice can her peers offer her? "Unlike British magazines, you're seen as very much on show here," says Mandi Norwood, the former editor of UK Cosmo and US Mademoiselle, now back there launching a new "women's shopping" title for Hearst. "Sarah would be wise to make sure she gets a great hairdresser and manicurist, as you're judged very much on your appearance here. I go to the nail bar every week, but never thought about it in the UK."
But she needn't worry too much about anti-Brit resentment, says Michele Lavery, who was previously Glenda Bailey's deputy at Harper's before returning to edit the Telegraph Magazine (which she says she has no intention of leaving, despite rumours linking her to the Elle vacancy). "There are always some people who say, 'Oh no, not another Brit!' but if you're good, you get the respect," she says.
"Sarah will find Glenda a very inspiring editor, very direct, very funny, who knows what she wants." Celebrity exclusives, presumably, being high on that list.
(Evening Standard, January 28 2004)
MAKE way, New York - yet another upstart Brit is jetting over to shake up your glossy magazines.
After Tina Brown, Anna Wintour and Mandi Norwood, Sarah Bailey is the latest London editor to be poached in the hope she will deliver that indefinable English magic. But what Manhattan's media elite may not realise about the softly spoken 37-year-old - who leaves Elle next month to join Harper's Bazaar as deputy to the equally British Glenda Bailey - is just how far fashion has taken her. After all, before she discovered Prada and Marc Jacobs, Bailey was just another Leftwing revolutionary selling Socialist Worker.
Such details are not, of course, mentioned in the "mwah-mwah" world of fashion magazines, where Bailey's promotion has been greeted with all the gushing praise familiar to Ab Fab viewers. To Bailey herself, the news is "beyond thrilling"; to Harper's publisher, Valerie Salembier, in a breathless staff email, the appointment "is very big and terrific news for all of us - I told you we'd have a great 2004!" But it is Salembier's brief description of the new deputy's career that suggests a reason for hiring her: "She did some wonderful celebrity stories that became quite famous and endlessly talked about." In a publishing sector increasingly dependent on celebrity cover stars, Sarah Bailey has a contacts book to die for.
In her office, just off Park Lane, she is delighted to chat about her favourite encounters - the Gwyneth Paltrow profile that began inside the actress's wardrobe, or Jennifer Aniston as seen by her best friends. Under Elle's previous editor, Fiona McIntosh, Bailey was made celebrity fixer, with the goal of hooking an A-list star for every cover story. By being immensely flexible and interminably persistent - Cameron Diaz took three years - she gained the publicists' respect, even though she says she never compromised by offering copy or picture approval.
"She's really good at pulling in the celebrities, and sadly that's the most important job nowadays for a magazine editor," says former Elle editor Nicola Jeal.
Her favourite has proved to be Aniston ("catnip for sales"), who has graced the cover three times recently. "She is the pearl of cover stars," she says. "It's a cliché, but I think she really has kept it real.
Her niceness didn't feel like a performance." THERE have, of course, been the "diva histrionics". The worst, she thinks, was Rupert Everett. "I had to stand outside the studio in the rain in Amsterdam for the crime of writing in my notebook while he was being photographed," she recalls. "He couldn't concentrate on giving the camera his best, lying on the floor looking luscious in a leather shirt." Did he apologise? "We had a sort of, 'Oh dear, poor sweetie, kiss-kiss' moment on the sofa, but I'd definitely lost my cool at that point.
The piece I wrote was arched." Then there are the stars who try to keep the borrowed designer clothes. "A fashion sample is the most precious commodity in this industry, and if an actress wants a sample that's a problem, as another magazine is expecting it after you," she says. "On one occasion a young American actress - a brunette - wanted a Dolce & Gabbana item so badly that after it was zipped back in my suitcase, she opened it and put it inside hers. When I confronted her, she said: 'They'll want to give it to me.' It was a horrific moment." Despite some prodding, Bailey's rigorous diplomacy prevents her from naming names. A subsequent examination of her cuttings narrows down the field, but Bailey remains discreet.
She does talk about "quite a moment" with Victoria Beckham.
"She was being photographed with dogs on the set, the light was fading, and Brooklyn was getting worried about the dogs. But Victoria was constantly on the phone to David, who was having issues with the amount of flesh that was to be displayed. It was an all-day shoot, and I don't quite understand why David had to be phoned quite so much. But you use your diplomatic skills." In the end, she did get the requisite flesh on the cover.
Bailey, from Marple, Cheshire, lives in north London with stationery designer Tim Solnick, her partner of nine years, as well as a cat. She became involved with student journalism while at Cambridge University - where she also developed her political credentials, selling copies of Socialist Worker to further the march towards revolution-"Yes, it's true," she admits.
"But I was a bit of a hopeless comrade. I used to sell the paper dressed in vintage 1950s party dresses." Her fashion obsession grew after IPC took her on as a trainee. She wrote for 19, Chat and Just 17, joining Elle in 1996 and taking the editor's chair in March 2002. She counts Marc Jacobs, Dries van Noten and Miuccia Prada as her gurus, and is today wearing a Prada skirt, a John Smedley V-neck sweater, Miu Miu shoes, and a Chanel watch with a green strap.
"This year is going to be all about green," she says. "It's quite wonderful and strange, the crazy synergy of fashion - I love the process." Did she pay for what she is wearing? She stretches her eyes in faux surprise. "What could you be suggesting?" she repl ies mischievously. "People think you spend your day unwrapping boxes and nobody can hear themselves think in the office because of the crinkle of tissue paper. I do buy a lot of clothes."
Does she spend more than, say, £1,000 a month? "It has certainly happened," she replies. "I had a horrific moment when I was in Prada in Milan and my bank phoned me and said my spending was consistent with fraud. Which is a shameful thing for a girl to admit."
ALTHOUGH circulation has fallen a couple of thousand during her tenure to around 200,000, Bailey sees Elle's improved fashion coverage as her main achievement. Fashion and shopping, she says, are "where it's at", and she believes Britain is ripe for a catalogue-style magazine that can emulate the success of Lucky in the States.
As for her own move in the other direction, what advice can her peers offer her? "Unlike British magazines, you're seen as very much on show here," says Mandi Norwood, the former editor of UK Cosmo and US Mademoiselle, now back there launching a new "women's shopping" title for Hearst. "Sarah would be wise to make sure she gets a great hairdresser and manicurist, as you're judged very much on your appearance here. I go to the nail bar every week, but never thought about it in the UK."
But she needn't worry too much about anti-Brit resentment, says Michele Lavery, who was previously Glenda Bailey's deputy at Harper's before returning to edit the Telegraph Magazine (which she says she has no intention of leaving, despite rumours linking her to the Elle vacancy). "There are always some people who say, 'Oh no, not another Brit!' but if you're good, you get the respect," she says.
"Sarah will find Glenda a very inspiring editor, very direct, very funny, who knows what she wants." Celebrity exclusives, presumably, being high on that list.
(Evening Standard, January 28 2004)
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