Announcing: Permanent Style magazine

*The magazine will be available online on PS on March 26. A list of stockists will also be published then*
*Tokyo magazine launch confirmed for Friday April 4th, 6-8pm, at Brycelands*

I told you a lot of exciting things were happening this year.

In two weeks’ time we will be releasing our first proper magazine - called, of course, Permanent Style - to readers and shops, but also newsagents and book shops. It will come out twice a year, in March and September.

It’s been a long time coming and a huge amount of the credit must go to Elliot Hammer, who has designed the magazine and managed the process, and sub-editor Bolaji Babafemi plus all the contributors (Alex, Jamie, André, Lucas, Emilie etc).

It felt like the right time to do a magazine. Permanent Style is 18 years old, large and influential (2 million readers last year) but with a lot of great content that is rather restricted on a computer screen (or increasingly, a mobile one).

The quality of what PS does has increased hugely over the years, compared to the little 300-word blog posts we used to do. Now we’ll spend a whole day at the epic Real McCoy’s headquarters in Japan, or summarise my experience with 60 of the world’s best tailors, all in one article.

Those kind of pieces deserve a big, hard-copy print on nice paper. Showing the magazine proofs to friends and readers recently, I was interested that the consistent reaction was how different the reading experience was to online - seeing everything presented together, noticing things for the first time, appreciating colours and combinations.

In an ideal world, this would have been the format of Permanent Style for a long time. It suits the material (and all the materials!) much more.

Over time, an increasing amount of the magazine will be in print first, designed for that format. In this first issue, that applies to the cover story and to the illustrations we commissioned.

Elliot knows a few great cartoonists, and we asked a couple to do particular pieces for Lucas’s feature on independent shops, and for a Tokyo shopping guide. (Each issue will have a particular geographic focus, and this one is Japan - it has its own section in the magazine on a different paper stock). Elliot then added his own designs to several features, like the ones above.

Finally there was the cover story - an interview with the wonderful Yasuto Kamoshita - which is exclusive to the magazine. We interviewed Kamoshita-san on a very hot evening in Milan, and then commissioned photographer Aoki Ulysses to go to his home in Tokyo, shooting him in several outfits around the house and garden.

The magazine will be released on March 26th. It is 150 pages long, with 28 articles and lots of photography.

Quite a few advertisers have supported it, which is wonderful. (Frankly, it’s the thing that makes it possible.) I won’t mention them all here, but one thing that meant a lot to me was that Anderson & Sheppard wanted to advertise - the only advert they have ever done in their history.

The magazine will cost £20 in the UK and then vary in shops around the world. It will be in selected newsagents as well, plus on the PS Shop online, but as with The Casual Style Guide we suggest that you support your local menswear store where you can, if they’ve fronted the money to stock it.

In fact, one reason for announcing the magazine now is that any shop around the world can apply for copies, and have them in stock for the launch date. We already have quite a few, but if any other shops would like to stock it please contact Lucas.

Going forward there will also be a bigger spread of writers in the magazine, reflecting the breadth we’ve managed to bring in over the past few years - people like Manish, Paul, Bernard Roetzel and others. There will always be a big chunk of me (sorry) but the PS reader has come to expect a cornucopia of accompanying people and styles.

The plan is for each magazine to have little regional focuses each time, and we might add other things like new sections and supplements as it grows.

For the moment, it’s just great to let everyone know, after over a year of working on this shiny new thing. We’re immensely proud of it, and I hope on March 26th when you can get yours, you will like it too.

There will be two launch events for the magazine, one in London and one in Tokyo. The one in London involves closing off the Royal Arcade, and is RSVP only (see below). Do email if you can come along. Meyrowitz are hosting it with us and Dalmore will be providing some great cocktails.