SOUL SISTAS Jane, Marie
For all those who believed that feisty Jane magazine could never be replaced, well, maybe we didn't need the rag after all.
Jane's print finale, its August issue, boasted among other things Eva Mendes in the buff on its cover. Inside you'll find a down-to-earth fashion feature called "Freaky Friday," in which two mag staffers (Kelley "The Glam One" Culp and Annemarie "Tomboy" Conte) switch wardrobes and styles for a week, then keep diaries of their experiences. Highlight? Annemarie's confession that she feels like Mr. T in one of those absurd overblown multi-strand hipster necklaces. Finally, someone admitted that trend's got to go.
But we got a really odd sense of déjà vu when we flicked through Marie Claire's September book. There on p. 87—wait, you'll never guess—two Maire Claire staffers exchange clothes for a week and record "diaries of a traumatic week."
Reached via a Hearst spokesperson, Marie Claire EIC Joanna Coles said, "I'm a total magpie. I stole the idea from a spring issue of British Vogue. It would never dawn on me to look at Jane magazine for ideas."
The upshot of all of this for Marie Claire: No other magazine had the guts to tackle anal bleaching (p. 136) this month.
[Jane-Claire comparison after the jump!]