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Calling all fashion savvy men…

Posted in Advertising, Media, Latest reporters' blogs, Lucy Tesseras April 8th, 2008 by Lucy Tesseras

The Sunday Telegraph launched ST Men’s Style this weekend, its new bi-annual glossy men’s fashion supplement.

Targeting affluent, style-conscious 30-something men, it seems to be the newspaper’s latest effort to entice a younger readership to its largely 60-plus audience and follows the launch of sister title ST Fashion aimed at women last September.

The first issue has a very crisp feel, with the front cover featuring nothing more than a pensive Ewan McGregor in a sharp white suit standing in a narrow white passageway, alongside the tagline ‘Style with attitude’.

Inside the look is similarly fresh, employing clean lines and white borders wherever possible, with the flowing font on page numbers and combination of illustration and photography helping to soften the look.

Advertisers are all top end with Ralph Lauren, Versace, Tom Ford and Prada taking the key front of magazine positions and Gucci featuring on the back cover.

The grade of high end advertisers reflects the content, with a guide to the best bespoke tailors on Savile Row, where suits cost an average of £2,000, and a fashion shoot of this season’s nautical themed menswear featuring pieces from Paul Smith, Yohji Yamamoto and Alexander McQueen.

Other fashion-led features include an interview with cover man McGregor in ‘Rebel with a Cause’, a behind the scenes look at Giorgio Armani dressing Chelsea FC and a piece on how menswear designers are fusing luxe with sportswear.

Fashion aside, ST also offers a feature on plucky British adventurers, manly grooming products and the fountain pen.

The credentials of contributors is high, with the former editor-in-chief of Esquire, Peter Howarth at the helm. He is joined by photographer Tim Bret-Day, who shot the new Agent Provocateur ad campaign and is an i-D regular, Bill Prince GQ’s deputy editor and Allan Kennedy, former fashion director at Arena.

The glossy style of the magazine has a similar feel to Jefferson Hack and Rankin Waddell’s AnotherMan magazine and Condé Nast’s GQ fashion spin off GQ Style, both of which are also bi-annual, but incur a hefty price tag.

This is the first glossy men’s newspaper supplement of its kind and as such could appeal to an as yet untapped market.

Women fare well with fashion supplements in the weekend papers with Style in The Sunday Times, Stella in The Sunday Telegraph and Observer Woman being published once a one in The Observer, but men have far less choice. They either have to scour the supplements for the odd men’s fashion feature, or make do with the main pages.

With the rise of the metrosexual man, with his disposable income and limited family responsibilities, it seems like a long overdue addition to The Sunday Telegraph and one that others might soon follow.