I still remember the first time I picked up an issue of Seventeen magazine. I was twelve years old, and it took some serious persuading on my part to convince my mom that I was old enough to read a magazine targeted to seventeen-year-old girls (My argument? Everyone knows you trade Seventeen for Cosmo the second your reach high school). But so began my love for magazines.. and aspirations to one day write for one. These days, however, with the shuttering of once-successful magazines and the catalog-thickness of still-existing ones, it's become the magazines themselves that have to do the convincing. Enter reality television.
"The Hills" brought serious buzz to Teen Vogue when Lauren Conrad and Whitney Port met as bubbly magazine "interns" for all the world to watch. Both girls moved on to bigger and better things — an intern budget can't support the fabulous lifestyles of reality stars. In "The City," Whitney's spinoff took a cue from their original success by enlisting another magazine in Elle. Although Elle was questioned for signing on to a pseudo-reality show like "The City," a weekly appearance on the small screen has brought such tremendous attention to the glossy and it has, almost single-handedly, turned from a publication into a brand. Last summer Elle sold more ad pages than Vogue for the first time in the magazine's 24-year history. Of course, there are more factors to Elle's recent success than a supporting role on "The City," but giving readers a sneak peek into the magazine's glamorous office and gorgeous staff certainly helps (Styleite believes their dynamic website and Twitter presence has a lot to do with it, too, and I wholeheartedly agree).A PAKISTAN TIME
