Twin is not a magazine about twins, but it is a style publication built on the twin passions of Rebbecca Smith, formerly of Lula Magazine, and British Vogue Junior Features Associate, Aimee Farrell. Twin celebrated the US launch of their bi-annual earlier this month, introducing US readers to Twin number two, an issue that's loosely based around the idea of the sublime. It features the late great Louise Bourgeois, Parisian model/muse Joanna Preiss and one of our favorite girls, the lovely Feja. Farrell and Smith started the magazine last year with a decidely feminine mission statement, a reaction to the doom and gloom of global recession. The magazine is a stunning anecdote to the destructive masculine forces which dominated the last millenium, and fittingly, the first issue used the Age of Aquarius as an editorial framework. We caught up with Farrell, a former FADER style contributor, to get the scoop on her latest awesome project. Read the full Q&A after the jump.
Coming from an editorial background, how did you go about making your own project?
Well, it’s very collaborative. There are themes, but we haven’t really made them that explicit. The current issue is based on the sublime. Before we started the magazine economically all these awful things were happening, and there really needed to be a change somehow—all these old systems were starting to crumble. We felt that the future might pull from a more feminine ideology, and a move away from this really forlorn, really male-dominated and competitive spirit.
Well men did fuck things up slightly.
Well, it felt like it had all gone a bit wrong, you know? Miranda July was really inspired by our idea and was compelled to write something for us. And the other big deal for us in issue one was getting Carol Ann Duffy, who just so recently had become the Poet Laureate, to curate this poetry portfolio. Poetry was one of the things that we felt wasn’t really anywhere else—certainly not with fashion at a really high level. Quite often there are brilliant features and then the fashion really falls down. We’re trying to get reads along with useful fashion images, with an undertone of feminism. But it’s not in your face. Hopefully it's very subtle.
What did Miranda July write about?
The Age of Aquarius. That was the theme for the first issue. And she wrote this really amazing piece, along with two another women, and it was very spontaneous. It had great impact and that’s what we opened the issue with.
Tell us about the current issue and where did the name come from?
The theme is a little more subtle for the second one, it's the sublime. It’s actually more of a mood than an all pervading theme. The name was something that Becky came up with. It's this idea of two people coming together, and that’s reflected in the very collaborative approach we have with everyone who contributes. Our website is twin factory, so it’s that play on the Warholian idea. Collaboration is the basis. It's not a magazine that’s about twins, although we may have more twins coming.
