C Magazine, California’s lifestyle publication, is celebrating its 20th anniversary this fall with a special issue featuring cover star Cindy Crawford.
Styled by Paul Cavaco and shot by Matthew Brookes at Paramount Studios, the shoot marked a full-circle moment for the magazine’s founder, editorial director and chief executive officer Jennifer Smith, who first stepped onto the lot as a 16-year-old intern for writer-producer Gary David Goldberg’s Ubu Productions in Los Angeles.
“Iconic Hollywood,” she said of photographing Crawford in that setting. “It was amazing.”
“She was a three-time C cover girl, even before we did this issue,” style and content director Andrew Barker, who joined the team seven years ago, added of Crawford. “There’s a timelessness to her. You’re still just as excited about Cindy today as you were 20, 40 years ago. She’s the O.G. supermodel for all of us.”
The very first issue of C Magazine was born from a desire to celebrate and showcase the energy, creativity and culture of the West Coast with stories unique to California. It came after Smith, with her family, relaunched Santa Barbara Magazine and decided to expand the concept to capture the wider California lifestyle. Smith had moved to L.A. from Michigan and has been calling it home since 1991.
“The first one is amazing,” Smith said of C Magazine’s inaugural issue, with Carolyn Murphy on the cover. “We had everybody, from an interview with Barry Diller to behind-the-scenes with Dede Wilsey at her museum, the de Young Museum. We had Ann Getty in San Francisco, Carolyn Murphy on the beach in Malibu. We did a fashion story on the San Andreas Fault. We had [chef] Thomas Keller from The French Laundry. It was the best of the best. And I think it started out with such a bang that everyone then trusted us going forward.”
C Magazine’s first cover, with model Carolyn Murphy.
With Smith at the helm, the core C Magazine team also includes Jenny Murray, president and editor, who has worked with Smith since Day One, and James Timmins, creative and design director, who has been with the magazine for a decade. While many work remotely, the team maintains an office in Santa Barbara, where Smith first established a workspace in 1999.
Today, releasing seven issues a year at $7.99 each, C Magazine has a total distribution of 135,000, including 120,000 subscriptions, and with 750,000 readers monthly — 90 percent women with a median age of 44 and median household income of $220,000. Top regions include Los Angeles and Orange County, followed by San Francisco and Santa Clara/Silicon Valley.
“One of our strengths is knowing the clients for our advertising partners,” Smith said. “Besides being able to write great stories and be giving an insider’s perspective, we can be a great advertising partner for them and say, ‘Well, what are your needs? We got it. We know this crowd. Do you need content?’ We’ve now almost become an agency. We’re creating a lot of custom content for everyone, from Chanel, Ralph Lauren, Dior, Vuitton, Thom Browne, you name it. They’re coming to us when they have a California activation that they need to amplify.”
“Putting a California lens on those international brands,” Barker said.
C Magazine has also released a book to reflect on 20 years, “California: Dream State: Stylish Living from Canyon to Coast,” with Rizzoli.
Among the highlights over the years is a feature and shoot with actress Kelly Lynch and writer-producer Mitch Glazer in the couple’s John Lautner-designed home in L.A., Smith said: “It’s Kelly on horseback, looking amazing. Mitch in his vintage car. It’s all of it. So we get design, we get fashion, we get interesting people. She’s an actress, he’s a filmmaker. We get architecture, we get nature. If that’s not a culmination of what C Magazine is, I don’t know what is.”
Looking back, what’s been the biggest challenge in this changing media landscape? Smith noted that staying relevant means evolving beyond traditional print.
Jennifer Smith
“You can’t just be a magazine,” she said. “As much as I want to just be hardcore print, you have to have the digital, you have to have the social, but you also have to do the clienteling for your advertisers and really give them that service.”
“Magazines have just become one of those higher art forms that people love and cherish,” Barker said. “It’s more of a luxury product.”
The 20th anniversary issue has more than 100 pages, showcasing California-based women including Oprah Winfrey at home in her garden and three-Michelin-starred chef Dominique Crenn, who’s behind the new Dior restaurant on Rodeo Drive.
Looking ahead, Smith remains optimistic.
“I still believe in the California dream,” she continued. “I just believe in this romantic California, and not to say that it doesn’t have its trials and tribulations, but at the end of the day, what else do I have to hang on to but that drive on [Pacific Coast Highway], windows down, music blasting?”
A look at C Magazine’s 20th anniversary issue, with Cindy Crawford.
