MissMagAddict
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source | fashionmagazine
Leith ♥ Lula
How a nice suburban Canadian girl became the toast of London.
Stylist Leith Clark is sleepy. She spent last night in her cups with Keira Knightley at a Vogue party, and today she’s been up since some ghastly hour styling for Poltock & Walsh, a cool little label showing during London Fashion Week. Her freckled face peeps out from behind her trademark bangs as she pads around backstage in Chanel flats and a Poltock & Walsh shift. Her dashing boyfriend, British art director James Hatt (they appeared together in a Paul Smith ad, don’t cha know), pops in to give her a good-luck kiss. How did a nice British boy like him end up with a Canadian girl like Clark? “I love Canadian girls,” he says simply, besotted.
He’s not the only one. The Evening Standard named Clark one of the most influential fashion people in London. With high-profile clients like Knightley, friends like Karl Lagerfeld, Kirsten Dunst and Erin Fetherson, freelance jobs for Vogue — British, American, Japanese and counting — and, oh yes, a little thing called her very own international already-cult-status magazine, Lula, the 28-year-old from Oakville, Ontario, is one of the names on everyone’s lips across the pond. In short, we’ve seen the new London (and Paris and New York). And she’s Canadian.
There’s a story, and it begins with quitting school in Toronto and deciding British Vogue was her favourite and that, well, she would simply move to London and intern there, and it ends (so far) with her being tapped to style ads for Chanel. But really the biggest, shiniest part of her growing renown is Lula: Girl of My Dreams. The über-girlie photography project–meets–zine collectible — people already scour eBay for back issues — is now sold everywhere from Canada to South Africa. Haven’t seen it? That’s probably because it sold out before you got to the shop, pauvre vous.
“It wasn’t like starting Lula was like ‘let’s make a magazine that’s pink,’” says Clark of the mag, now in its third year. She and her publisher, photographer Damon Heath, publish two very heavy, glossy issues a year. “I just started going, what did I love about fashion first? And the first time I remember being obsessed with someone and how they looked was the Childlike Empress from The Neverending Story. I was walking around the house with necklaces on my head, thinking I looked amazing.”
Which probably goes a long way toward explaining the mag’s shtick. A rambling dreamscape full of seemingly random stories and glossy fashion shoots, this is the kind of fantasyland where you can find everything from still-life photos of Christian Louboutin stilettos covered in candy floss to a fashion spread inspired by their “crush” on Lanvin designer Alber Elbaz (hint: there are a lot of bow ties). The artists behind the Sigur Rós videos share air time with Q&As with long-lost ’80s actresses like Martha Plimpton and interviews with Feist and designer Christopher Kane. The font is always curly, the arty photo shoots are full of lovely girls in various states of designer disarray, and the photography is regularly interspersed with art projects, like the one where 13 artists were asked to paint their takes on Dolly Parton. A back page is simply a picture of a Strawberry Shortcake doll bidding good night.
OK, so it’s a little “niche.” But it’s a niche that seems to be gathering every international déshabillé hipster in Chanel and heavy eyeliner into its puff-sleeved orbit. Contributors — who all work gratis — have included Miranda July, Ellen von Unwerth and Karen Elson. Kirsten Dunst was once a guest editor, and a Lula issue launch party during Spring 2008 Paris Fashion Week was attended by a who’s who of the cool list, including Lagerfeld, Sofia Coppola, Zoe Cassavetes, Audrey Tautou, Rachel Bilson and Gemma Ward. Not bad for a magazine whose circulation is a mere 72,000 copies and which doesn’t even have a proper office, and all the staff have freelance jobs.
“I love that it’s like a secret,” admits Clark. “Like this guy in one of the little delis in New York—if I duck into it and ask, he’ll be like, ‘Oh, that sells out before I open the box!’ And that’s really cool, but it’s also not good, because you’re missing out on all these people. The most amazing ones are the people who buy it and think about things they would never read about otherwise. I’ve read some of the blogs where girls are trying to find it, and they love it. It should be easier.”
So far it’s all love from insider circles. But Clark — who spent years interning at the likes of Interview, Harper’s Bazaar and British Vogue — knows the only thing an industry loves more than anointing a darling is seeing a backlash against that darling.
“We’re going to get negative responses soon,” she says matter-of-factly. “It just can’t be happy and fun.”
Negative responses like what?
“How long can you live in a dream world, right?” she says, smiling mischievously. “My answer is always, but I’m sure lots of people don’t agree.”
. She grew up an hour from where I live now and she is the creator of one of my favourite magazines out there.
I could never bring myself to pay that much.
. Such a great idea 
