HOW TO WIN (FAMOUS) FRIENDS AND INFLUENCE (POWERFUL) PEOPLE
HE HANGS OUT WITH GIGI, PARTIES WITH KENDALL AND PERSUADED NAOMI TO LAUNCH A YOUTUBE CHANNEL. BUT WHO IS DEREK BLASBERG? AND HOW DID HE BECOME THE MOST CONNECTED MAN IN FASHION?
Derek Blasberg: the man who’s friends with every woman of note. But who is he? Laura Craik finds out
“When I moved to NEW YORK, I knew I had to create MY OWN FAMILY”
n the one hand, it’s easy to interview Derek Blasberg: he’s funny, open, engaging and, thanks to his journalistic background, knows the kind of quotes you need. On the other, it’s an effing nightmare. Not once, even in the limo where I first meet him, speeding off from the Burberry show to his next appointment at The Connaught, do we enjoy uninterrupted facetime. ‘Hi, Rianne!’ he yells out of the window, mid-sentence, in honeyed Midwestern tones, as one of his 1,O95,638 supermodel friends walks by. ‘Look how pretty she is…’ At Burberry, Blasberg was placed where he is always placed: in the best seat in the house, a few bums down from Anna Wintour, the editor from whose magazine he was once fired (more on that later). Always sandwiched between two beautiful celebrities, he loves to mischievously catch the eye of whichever supermodel friend is walking past him on the catwalk, winking at Gigi, pulling a face at Bella, causing them to crack a smile. Even if you haven’t heard of Blasberg, 37, head of fashion and beauty partnerships at YouTube (‘In simplistic terms, my job is to help create more fashion and beauty content on the platform’), you’ll have seen him. There he is, front row with Kate Moss and Julianne Moore. There he is again, at a party with Serena Williams, Jennifer Lawrence, Kendall Jenner and the Hadids. Up he pops, draped around Victoria Beckham, hanging out with Mark Ronson, posing with Jake Gyllenhaal, giggling with Dasha Zhukova, chatting with Gwyneth Paltrow… and that was just September. To say that Blasberg is wellconnected is an understatement. Not only does he seem to know everybody: they seem to love him. Rare is the shot where he and his celebrity friends aren’t laughing like drains, no doubt at some scurrilous piece of gossip that will eventually make its way into the papers, or – more likely – is too scurrilous to print. When Gwyneth and Dakota Johnson were photographed laughing together at dinner in April, finally putting a stop to tabloid speculation that there was animosity between Chris Martin’s ex and his current girlfriend, naturally, it was at Blasberg’s birthday party. ‘I know both of those women individually and they’re both super-incredible girls,’ says Blasberg of the photo. ‘I didn’t think it was such a big deal.’ Gwyneth once said that she fell in love with Blasberg after 1O seconds. How did he charm her? What did he say? ‘I don’t remember. What’s a concise way to answer that stupid question?’ Even when he’s arch, he’s endearing. He is often compared to Truman Capote: both are charming, from Middle America and natural confidantes of women – although Blasberg is better dressed, in sharp suits (sometimes in a zany colour) and preppy polo shirts. So how did a self-confessed ‘simple boy from Missouri’ become as ubiquitous a celebrity appendage as a Chanel bag? ‘There is no top-secret insider information to having fun or going out or making friends,’ he laughs. Blasberg moved to New York from St Louis, Missouri, when he was 18 to study journalism at New York University. ‘I was a very big overachiever. I knew that the way I was going to get out of St Louis and start a new life in New York was not as a model, like [fellow St Louis resident] Karlie Kloss. I had to have a more traditional academic route. I didn’t have a friend of the family. I didn’t have a fun gay uncle in New York. I was so daunted at the prospect of moving. My mother said, “People move to New York all the time. You can do this.” Thank God she gave me that pep talk, or I’d be slinging shirts at the mall.’ The first person he met was a teen model from Maryland, who had moved into the dorm below. She was his first entry into the fashion world, taking him to parties held by her agency. Until recently (when she moved to Berlin), they remained in touch. ‘I was very aware when I moved to New York – this is pre-Facebook, before any social networking – I knew I had to create my own family.’ And he did, building up his own network of friends by going out a lot. Did he know he was super-charming, back then, from the very first handshake? ‘I think I’m a nice guy with good manners who’s innately extrovert. But when I think of super-charming, I think of a casanova who’s toying with your hair.’ I tell him I’m glad he’s not a hair-twirler. ‘OK. I’m somewhere between charming and creepy? I’ll take that,’ he says, deadpan. Was it his mother, Carol, who taught him charm and manners? ‘No way! She’s terrible!’ he jokes.
“I’m bad at KEEPING SECRETS. That’s why I have so MANY FRIENDS”
His mother, whom he frequently references on Instagram, was the managing editor of a medical journal called The Annals of Thoracic Surgery. (‘I’d like to think it was the ELLE of the cardiovascular scene,’ he quips.) His father was a certified public accountant. So far, so uncharismatic. His first job after graduating from NYU in 2OO4 was, of course, at American Vogue, where he was an assistant. He was fired. ‘I was a terrible assistant. That’s a very tough, hierarchical position.’ It was there he met the bottled-water heiress Lauren Santo Domingo, the Brooke Astor to his Truman Capote and one of his closest friends. Through her he met Dasha Zhukova and a phalanx of other socialites that ensured he never wanted for material for his next job, editor-at-large for Style.com, where he wrote a column called The Blasblog. In 2O1O, he published his first book, Classy: Exceptional Advice For The Extremely Modern Lady (it was a New York Times bestseller, natch) and became a contributing editor at Harper’s Bazaar US, where former executive editor Kristina O’Neill commissioned him and he was known for his energy and reliability. ‘Derek is like Beyoncé,’ she says. ‘He has more hours in his day than most people do. I’ve always admired his stamina and dependability. He would be out late covering an event or reporting a story, but the piece would still be in my inbox before I woke up.’ He left Harper’s Bazaar in 2O15 to join Vanity Fair as the magazine’s Our Man on the Street, a newly formed role that combined writing with video content creation (VF’s former editor, Graydon Carter, is something of a mentor). The following year, Blasberg started hosting CNN Style, leaving in 2O18 to join YouTube.
Combining, as it does, the glamour of fashion with the power of tech – not to mention the global influence afforded by YouTube’s two billion logged-in viewers per month – the role of head of fashion and beauty partnerships seems made for him. And he for it, utilising his journalistic sense for a good story with his ease in front of the camera and prodigious contacts book – the latter worth way more, even, than the fortune YouTube is allegedly paying him. Who else could persuade Naomi Campbell to launch her own channel? ‘Before the new Fashion channel, Naomi wanted to dabble in the YouTube space, but there wasn’t a fashion person to help her,’ he explains. ‘What appealed is that she is the star, the producer, the director. She has final cut, she controls what’s uploaded. She’s happy, because it’s hers.’ Since being uploaded in July, ‘Naomi Campbell’s Airport Routine’ has had more than 1.9 million views. Blasberg says that the appeal of YouTube, for Campbell and for fashion brands, is that it allows them to control their own narrative. Fashion brands were extremely slow to embrace social media; the ‘invite-only’ modus operandi of the industry being completely at odds with the open access of the internet. ‘Was it arrogance, or fear?’ muses Blasberg. ‘Tom Ford didn’t even allow you to bring in cameras. That wasn’t so long ago. And now they’re just giving it away. Now it’s livestreamed. Here you are. Here’s our show. YouTube is your ultimate frontrow seat to the world of fashion,’ he twinkles, knowing the line is corny, but saying it anyway. We arrive at The Connaught Hotel, where Rose, Blasberg’s assistant, has reserved the best seat in the bar. We both order sparkling water (Blasberg isn’t teetotal, but always paces himself – crucial when you’re out as long and as often as he is). I ask him what his worst quality is. ‘Maybe FOMO,’ he muses. ‘And have you ever heard of GOMO? GOMO is the gratitude of missing out. Everyone was talk… Hi, Mary. This is my friend, Laura.’ Mary McCartney is standing over us, in a pale pink Stella McCartney suit. She points at Blasberg’s watch, which is wound around his leather wallet. ‘Oh my God,’ says Mary. ‘Can you just talk me through this?’ ‘It’s a watch,’ says Blasberg. ‘Before cell phones, people used watches to tell the time.’ ‘Have you seen anyone do this?’ Mary asks me. ‘Maybe he doesn’t want a tan line?’ I suggest. ‘You put the watch on the wallet in the hopes that if you don’t forget one you won’t forget the other,’ says Blasberg. ‘I like your little suit.’ ‘Do the trainers go?’ asks Mary. She spots my dictaphone. ‘Oh, sorry. I didn’t realise you were…’ She says her goodbyes. ‘So now I’m into the idea of the rise of GOMO,’ Blasberg continues, as though Mary McCartney never happened (one imagines Madonna/Princess Diana/the Pope could appear and
“I don’t COMPLAIN. I’m living my dreams, SO WHO NEEDS SLEEP?”
he’d remain unfazed). ‘I’m going to stay in tonight and think, Oh, I’m grateful I stayed home.’ Blasberg isn’t actually staying home tonight: he is co-hosting the launch party of YouTube.com/Fashion with Katie Grand, editor-inchief of Love. Everyone will be there, despite it being a Monday night. I can’t imagine Blasberg staying in, ever. ‘I don’t want to discourage the narrative that I go out all the time and that I’m a lot of fun, but in actuality I spend as many nights at home as I do going out,’ he says. ‘I just don’t post about it. I was in my hotel before midnight last night, watching Orange Is The New Black.’ He adds that he is just as happy staying home with his long-term boyfriend, venture capitalist Nick Brown, in their apartment on New York’s Upper East Side. Naturally, they Netflix and chill on monogrammed Ralph Lauren pillows.
Watching him speak to five people at once at the Burberry show, and being interrupted yet again at The Connaught by another friend, I can scarcely fathom how exhausting being Derek must be. Does it ever feel burdensome, having to be ‘on’ all the time? ‘No burden. Friends are the good part of life. My burdens are not my friends. My burdens are deadlines, early shows.’ He must be good at keeping secrets, I suggest. ‘Are you going to tell me a secret?’ he whoops. ‘Something you’ve stolen? Affairs? I’m bad at keeping secrets. That’s why I have so many friends,’ he says, deadpan. ‘Of course I’m exceptional at keeping secrets. And I give good advice and I listen to people when they’re having problems.’ His listening skills might have earned him a vast network of friends, but surely there’s an inner circle he turns to when he wants someone to listen? ‘I don’t have one best friend. I have a long list. I think it’s cheesy when Naomi talks about “chosen family”, but I have a chosen group of friends. “Who’s your best friend?” feels like a question you ask a teenager.’ I wonder whether there’s anyone left on the planet that he’d like to meet. ‘The Queen of England,’ he shoots back. But he has, of course, met Meghan: ‘Yes. I’ll tell you one thing that applies to Meghan. I’m going to tell you a secret that I think applies to everyone. I’m going to tell you some disappointing news. So Meghan, Kendall, Gigi, all those girls, are very nice. And one reason they’re very nice is because they’re living their dreams. Kendall grew up wanting to be a model. Gigi’s mom was a model. Meghan’s the princess of England. Wouldn’t you be so disappointed if a teenage supermodel was an asshole? The [negative] stories are perpetuated by people who are unhappy. Those people who those stories are about are typically, innately very happy.’ Several hours later, at the Love/YouTube party on the top floor of newly opened London hotel The Standard, ‘those people’ are looking very happy indeed. I spot Kendall Jenner with her newly dyed blonde hair, Gigi and Bella Hadid, Irina Shayk looking very much ‘Bradley who?’, Maya Jama looking equally ‘Stormzy who?’, Christina Aguilera, Rita Ora, Daisy Lowe and Brooklyn Beckham, all chowing down on roast potatoes in the hotel’s 1Oth floor Decimo restaurant. And in the middle of it all is Blasberg, holding court. Monday night or not, it’s a late one, with everyone throwing shapes to Taylor Dayne and Taylor Swift. For a golden moment, I feel 18 again, at the centre of the universe, with nowhere else I’d rather be. Except maybe in bed. The next day, the fashion circus moves to Milan. According to his Instagram feed, Blasberg is out with Jennifer Lopez and Kaia Gerber at the Versace aftershow party – so I’m surprised when an email from him pops up the following morning, checking whether I enjoyed the Love party. Rarely in the history of interviews has a subject issued a follow-up email. ‘I hope I didn’t come off blasé about being an extrovert when we were talking,’ he writes. ‘Going out is a big part of my job, of course, but it also comes very naturally to me and I still enjoy it. I know going out doesn’t come easily to everyone, and I don’t take it for granted. That said, even when I’m at the end of my rope, when dinner went late and there’s an early morning show, I don’t complain about any of it. When I was a kid, I longed to get to where the action was. I’m living my dreams, so who needs sleep? ;) Xo Derek’.