Niche Fashion Magazines as Micro Societies

The article aims to discuss the functioning of niche fashion magazines, those positioned outside the commercia! circuit and widely distributed. In doing so, it focuses on two French case studies, 'Purple' and 'Self Service', founded in the first half of the Nineties and still active today. These magazines are models of the responses and impulses provided to the editorial panorama through the questioning of established practices of production, distribution and fruition as well as the construction of an alternative to the official circuit. They are different from popular periodicals as they were self-initiated, i.e. not supported by a publisher, and are characterized by a high level of experimentation and research, a slow periodicity, the attention to hidden worlds, a horizontal business vision. The article dwells on the importance of niche fashion magazines not as means of mediation or communication but as 'places' in which people can act, recognize and establish relations with one another. These publications may be understood as 'micro societies' and they construct communities that are shaped by their founders, their readers and all those who in one way or another contribute to their evolution. The longevity of 'Purple' and 'Self Service' seems to support this position, since in spite of having changed over time, often putting themselves on a sounder footing and establishing a dialogue with the fashion system, they still cultivate the collaborative dimension today, handling relations and the publishing project in the independent manner of their origins. The article has a high level of originality due to the lack of attention, in the field of fashion and design studies in Italy, towards niche magazines and more generally towards fashion periodical publishing. Methodologically, the article makes use of in-depth historiographic research conducted in archives. The impact is international as Cambridge Scholar Publishing is an accredited publisher in the academic field and the book brings together contributions from leading international scholars in the field of magazine research and magazine studies–Marcadent is the only Italian author selected fo this book.