Muse is a new biannual publication from Robb Report. Image credit: Muse
Luxury magazine Robb Report has always been focused on catering to wealthy people of all genders, but now the brand is launching a separate publication catered to women.
Called Muse, the title will be run by Jill Newman, the long-time executive editor of the style section at Robb Report. In addition to living online at robbreport.com/muse, Muse will also be getting its own biannual print publication.
“Women shape opinion, our culture, our economy and our world," Ms. Newman said. "Today’s leaders in business, the arts, science and social change are intrepid, innovative and highly original visionaries—women who seek not only to cultivate their own talents and broaden their horizons but also motivate others to undertake their own voyages of discovery.
"Muse by Robb Report is a unique forum in which these influential personalities—trailblazers, tastemakers, idealists and disruptors share their views and values on topics ranging from style, design, the arts, travel, wellness, wealth management and philanthropy,” she said.
Along with the publication, Muse will also host a series of events called Musings that will bring together women from a variety of backgrounds to talk about ideas and issues that are important to them. The first Musing will take place on Mar. 28.
In this Q&A, Ms. Newman talks about the inspiration behind Muse and what her goals are for the new publication. Here is the dialogue:
Tell me a bit about Muse.
Robb Report has been around 40 years and it’s always kind of been catered to males. We always talked about doing something for women.
When Robb Report was acquired by Penske 14 months ago, it gave us the momentum to develop something for women. We had talked about it in the past but we didn’t have the resources to get something done.
The core of the idea for Musings is what we are calling change agents. We have discussions with 12 women across fields in art architecture, philanthropy, conservation, etc. It’s a platform for women to talk to women about things that matter, obstacles they’ve overcome, ways they’ve paved the way for others.
There’s a lot of interesting people out there and not everyone knows their stories. People with meaningful contributions and achievements and that not everyone will know.
I also think Muse is more personal and not as business focused. Robb Report is always about the products, about craftsmanship, what goes into making them. Muse is people-focused. What we try to frame it as is a platform for women to share their views and values.
One example is Natalie Massanet, founder of Net-A-Porter. She was one of the first in the luxury ecommerce space. She was a disruptor in that space. She talked about getting started and funding and it was very challenging.
Another great example Ann Colgin. About 30 years ago she started her vineyard, which is a very male-dominated field. It caught the attention of Bernard Arnault and he made a significant investment of their company.
We have one article about fashion and we enlisted Lynn Yaeger who wrote a witty piece about women and the power suit and the history of the power suit back in WWI and women wearing pants.
Muse's first issue. Image credit: Muse
Could you tell me what the online part of Muse will be like?
The online component of Muse will be similar to print. One of the key features will be the thought leaders category where we continue having conversations with women in the same vein as the print edition.
In doing the research for this issue, one interesting idea leads to another. That’s how we’ve gotten a lot of our speakers and contributors. Someone tells us their story, which leads us to someone else and so on.
We want to continue to bring to light interesting stories from a women’s perspective. We will continue to cover health and wellness, finance as it relates to women, travel will be a big one.
Jaime O'Banion for Muse. Image credit: Muse
What are your goals for Muse?
I hope that we can engage women across fields. We want to facilitate more dialogue between women.
We hope that it can serve as a kind of forum that brings women together to learn about other projects and be inspired by them. It creates this kind of support system.
The more we can bring people together and help them learn about things they might not have known about, the better we can serve the community.