Women's Wear Daily

Women's Wear Daily is depicted as a fashion publication whose influence reaches from advertising decisions to the rooms where designers and industry figures gather. The diary’s glimpses are brief but distinct: one concerns John Fairchild Jr.’s refusal to run a Perry Ellis ad, and another notices a WWD reporter asking pointed questions at a party for Bill Blass.

Editorial Authority and Advertising

At a fashion show in May 1986, the diary records a dispute over a Perry Ellis advertisement placed by Jerry Della Femina’s agency. The ad showed a boy model reading a book that included the word “fuck,” and Fairchild would not run it in Women's Wear Daily. The account presents the refusal as an exercise of editorial control over what could appear in the publication, even in an advertisement.

Della Femina’s reported response sharpened the conflict: he objected that Fairchild might push around Jerry Zipkin and other people in the fashion world, but could not dictate terms to advertising agencies. The episode exposes a tension between a publication’s authority over its pages and the leverage of the businesses that buy advertising. The diary’s narrator takes pleasure in hearing Fairchild challenged, rather than treating his editorial decision as beyond dispute.

Reporters in the Fashion Social World

Women's Wear Daily also appears through a reporter at a party Claudia Cohen Perelman hosted for Bill Blass. Among the guests were Jerry Zipkin, Nan Kempner, and Carolina Herrera; the WWD reporter was remembered as wearing no lipstick and asking tough questions. The narrator predicted that she would go far, linking her prospects to her willingness to probe rather than simply participate in the party’s glamorous setting.

Together, these brief appearances place Women's Wear Daily at the intersection of fashion coverage, editorial judgment, and industry relationships. The publication is not described through its internal operations; instead, its standing emerges through the authority attributed to Fairchild and the journalist’s presence among prominent fashion figures.