Gabbriette is on the hunt. “Right now I’m reading — actually my favorite author... Where is it?” she asks, more to herself than to me, on the other end of this early morning video call. The rockstar baddie-turned-cooking queen is pacing around her boudoir. The book she’s after, which never materializes, is Courtney Love: The Real Story by William Joseph Martin. Eventually, Gabbriette gives up the hunt and perches on her bed to tell me about her two other faves from the author’s very gothic and very gay ’90s-era oeuvre: Drawing Blood (a gory, sex-stuffed murder mystery) and The Lazarus Heart, a fanfic sequel to the cult film The Crow that centers on a “controversial S&M photographer.”
This story appears as a FRONTPAGE digital cover story and in their Spring 2024 print magazine.
“It’s hard and edgy, but also beautiful and bright.” The four adjectives used by Martine Ali to describe silver could easily be used to describe her, too. As one of New York’s biggest jewelry designers, the alloy has fused with her identity. “Gold feels far too precious, and oftentimes it’s done very delicately,” she says. “Silver just has this universal ability to appeal to different people in different ways.”
It’s this versatility that Ali has tapped into since launching her namesake brand in 2010. Though her designs fit into the familiar categories of bracelets, necklaces, earrings, and rings, Martine Ali pieces are meant to be modular — creative building blocks ready to be recontextualized by the wearer.
This story appears as a FRONTPAGE digital cover story and in their Winter 2023 print magazine.
On Friday, April 9, 2019, as Berlin reported 1,019 new cases of coronavirus, the city’s highest daily number since October, a stream of celebrities were photographed outside of Berghain. But it wasn’t a party they were attending. The legendary club in the heart of the city had been chosen by Bottega Veneta creative director Daniel Lee as the locale for their new runway show, titled Salon 02. It was the second iteration of a new concept that had begun in London in October, an attempt to inject some mystery into fashion via secret, super-exclusive shows that show off collections that aren’t unveiled publicly until months later.
In theory, it was a perfect pairing: a nightclub renowned for its secrecy, exclusivity, and hedonism, hosting a fashion show for one of the world’s biggest brands three months after Lee made headlines for deleting the label’s social media accounts. The only proof that anything had happened — at least at first — were the paparazzi photos of the guests invited to the event, walking outside of the venue. While the actual show took place in the Halle am Berghain, a massive hall that can be rented out to brands, the secrecy of the entire production cloaked this detail in the clout of staging a show at one of the world’s most famous nightclubs.
Down a cold, cement staircase and through a cavernous tunnel somewhere in Berlin, Ai Weiwei sits quietly at a long table in a brick hall. It’s early, and as the city outside begins to wake up, Ai is busy scrolling through his phone and sipping tea. A few feet away, sunlight streams into an open courtyard set two floors below ground. There’s a serenity and completeness to the scene because, in a way, this former brewery turned underground art studio is a perfect metaphor for the artist’s journey. Here, in what he calls his “underground temple,” Ai has found peace and come full circle.
This story appears as a FRONTPAGE digital cover story and in their Spring 2022 print magazine.
When Omar Rudberg first met his Young Royals co-star, Edvin Ryding, it wasn’t a meet-cute. It was a meet-stressed, mixed with a bit of meet-sweaty. For Rudberg, landing a second audition for the Swedish Netflix series had put him on the verge of a big break; a first step towards launching an acting career after years spent entrenched in the music scene as part of an award-winning boy band. As he burst into the chemistry read for the series five minutes late, there was no time to introduce himself to the person who would become his co-star. “I was so scared,” he recalls of the audition that would change his life. “I sat next to him and we just started. We met for the first time in character, basically, and it was just there. It was natural. It was perfect.”
This story appears as a FRONTPAGE digital cover story and in their Summer 2023 print magazine.
A recent boom and bust cycle provides a lesson in why LGBTQIA+ media should be owned by LGBTQIA+ people.
As the effects of the pandemic rip through the publishing industry, it’s fitting that the biggest story in queer media in 2020 was that the newest outlet that prominent LGBTQIA+ writers were flocking to wasn't a publication, but a social media channel by the world’s largest subscription streaming service. The “trendiness” of the community is clearly still enticing, but sustainability isn’t built off trends. If queer media is going to survive, the only way forward is to take note of what went right, sift through what went wrong, and learn from our mistakes so we can ensure a sustainable future for the queer media we deserve.
Featured on Nieman Lab.
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Gabbriette is on the hunt. “Right now I’m reading — actually my favorite author... Where is it?” she asks, more to herself than to me, on the other end of this early morning video call. The rockstar baddie-turned-cooking queen is pacing around her boudoir. The book she’s after, which never materializes, is Courtney Love: The Real Story by William Joseph Martin. Eventually, Gabbriette gives up the hunt and perches on her bed to tell me about her two other faves from the author’s very gothic and very gay ’90s-era oeuvre: Drawing Blood (a gory, sex-stuffed murder mystery) and The Lazarus Heart, a fanfic sequel to the cult film The Crow that centers on a “controversial S&M photographer.”
This story appears as a FRONTPAGE digital cover story and in their Spring 2024 print magazine.
“It’s hard and edgy, but also beautiful and bright.” The four adjectives used by Martine Ali to describe silver could easily be used to describe her, too. As one of New York’s biggest jewelry designers, the alloy has fused with her identity. “Gold feels far too precious, and oftentimes it’s done very delicately,” she says. “Silver just has this universal ability to appeal to different people in different ways.”
This story appears as a FRONTPAGE digital cover story and in their Winter 2023 print magazine.
On Friday, April 9, 2019, as Berlin reported 1,019 new cases of coronavirus, the city’s highest daily number since October, a stream of celebrities were photographed outside of Berghain. But it wasn’t a party they were attending. The legendary club in the heart of the city had been chosen by Bottega Veneta creative director Daniel Lee as the locale for their new runway show, titled Salon 02. It was the second iteration of a new concept that had begun in London in October, an attempt to inject some mystery into fashion via secret, super-exclusive shows that show off collections that aren’t unveiled publicly until months later.
In theory, it was a perfect pairing: a nightclub renowned for its secrecy, exclusivity, and hedonism, hosting a fashion show for one of the world’s biggest brands three months after Lee made headlines for deleting the label’s social media accounts. The only proof that anything had happened — at least at first — were the paparazzi photos of the guests invited to the event, walking outside of the venue. While the actual show took place in the Halle am Berghain, a massive hall that can be rented out to brands, the secrecy of the entire production cloaked this detail in the clout of staging a show at one of the world’s most famous nightclubs.
Down a cold, cement staircase and through a cavernous tunnel somewhere in Berlin, Ai Weiwei sits quietly at a long table in a brick hall. It’s early, and as the city outside begins to wake up, Ai is busy scrolling through his phone and sipping tea. A few feet away, sunlight streams into an open courtyard set two floors below ground. There’s a serenity and completeness to the scene because, in a way, this former brewery turned underground art studio is a perfect metaphor for the artist’s journey. Here, in what he calls his “underground temple,” Ai has found peace and come full circle.
This story appears as a FRONTPAGE digital cover story and in their Spring 2022 print magazine.
When Omar Rudberg first met his Young Royals co-star, Edvin Ryding, it wasn’t a meet-cute. It was a meet-stressed, mixed with a bit of meet-sweaty. For Rudberg, landing a second audition for the Swedish Netflix series had put him on the verge of a big break; a first step towards launching an acting career after years spent entrenched in the music scene as part of an award-winning boy band. As he burst into the chemistry read for the series five minutes late, there was no time to introduce himself to the person who would become his co-star. “I was so scared,” he recalls of the audition that would change his life. “I sat next to him and we just started. We met for the first time in character, basically, and it was just there. It was natural. It was perfect.”
This story appears as a FRONTPAGE digital cover story and in their Summer 2023 print magazine.
A recent boom and bust cycle provides a lesson in why LGBTQIA+ media should be owned by LGBTQIA+ people.
As the effects of the pandemic rip through the publishing industry, it’s fitting that the biggest story in queer media in 2020 was that the newest outlet that prominent LGBTQIA+ writers were flocking to wasn't a publication, but a social media channel by the world’s largest subscription streaming service. The “trendiness” of the community is clearly still enticing, but sustainability isn’t built off trends. If queer media is going to survive, the only way forward is to take note of what went right, sift through what went wrong, and learn from our mistakes so we can ensure a sustainable future for the queer media we deserve.
Featured on Nieman Lab.
BACK TO THE TOP