Hamptons People

Fashion People - Audacy | Puck

In this episode of Fashion People, host Lauren Sherman interviews Rory Satrin, proprietor of the Hamptons Chronicle, about her new local pub

Key takeaways

• Local journalism can thrive even in wealthy areas like the Hamptons by blending highbrow commentary with intimate community storytelling.

Main topics

• Launch and mission of the Hamptons Chronicle
• Cultural events in the Hamptons (e.g., artists and writers softball game)

Notable quotes

"It's like knowing your customer. It is like so specific." – On the unique offerings at Gorsuch in Aspen.

Conclusion

The episode highlights how personal passion, deep community engagement,

Transcript preview

Speaker 3 (0:03) Hello and welcome to Fashion People. I'm Lauren Sherman, writer of Puck's Fashion and Beauty Memo Line Sheet. And today with me on the show is Rory Satrin, proprietor of the Hamptons Chronicle. We're talking about what's happening from Amaganza to Shelter Island, the Chris and Gio wedding, mood board brands, the Jonathan Anderson fake news, and so much more. Speaker 3 (0:32) Happy Tuesday, everyone. Hope you had a great week. I was in Aspen this weekend, as mentioned, and had quite a good time going around to all the stores. I don't normally do that on vacation, but I was technically there for work to interview Sunita Kumar Nair, who wrote this book about tennis and fashion for the Aspen Institute at the Little Nell for this series they've been doing this summer. It was really nice. Thanks to everybody for having me. But therefore, I felt like I needed to. to go around to the stores, check stuff out. I tried on a Chanel jacket. It was very nice. This store was lovely. The Prada store there, though, is amazing. It's one of their only mountain stores, I believe they call them, or something to do with the mountains. They have that one in Aspen. Then they have three outside of North America, I think, mostly in Europe. And it's really, really well-merchandised. Like, there was stuff for... Speaker 3 (1:28) hardcore Prada people who just want like a taffeta dress. And then there was also stuff for people who have never bought from Prada before and, you know, want something that works in the mountains with cowboy boots. It was, it was cool. I also went to Kimo Sabe, obviously, and it smelled like burnt skin and hair at noon. And I guess it smells like alcohol at night because everybody goes there like 10 p.m. to drink or start drinking or whatever. I guess they buy Cowboy Boots drunk. It was fun though. I had a good time. Definitely the best store is Gorsuch, which, um, Yes, that Gorsuch. But they sell like leather dirndl shorts and silk jackets that really only look appropriate in Aspen or the Alps. It is, as my friend Becky Malinsky said, talk about knowing your customer. It is like so specific. Amazing brands, really beautiful stuff. They had this brand Pero, P-E-R-O, that gorgeous like embroidery beaded stuff. And it was busy. It's, you know, it was fascinating. It's like, that's what a retail store is for. Anyway, read my report online sheet and enjoy this conversation with Rory. Speaker 2 (2:42) Rory Satrin, welcome back to Fashion People. Thank you so much for having me, Lauren. Proprietor of your own newspaper now. Very different Speaker 3 (2:52) from the last time you joined me. Speaker 2 (2:54) Very different. I know. Derek Blasberg sent me an email with information about a TikTok happening in Bridgehampton. And he was like, this is right up your alley. And I'm like, OK, so now that's how I'm thought of, the person that writes about tics. Speaker 3 (3:10) So we're going to get all into the Hamptons Chronicle today. But first, I just want to ask you, I was actually in Aspen this weekend, which someone referred to as the Hamptons of the mountains, and that the same people hang out. But how was your weekend? What did you do? Did you do anything Hamptons-y? Speaker 2 (3:32) I mean, I always do Hampton seat things now. That's the thing about running a small town newspaper is you really have to get out into the community, which as an introvert, I'm definitely forcing myself to do it. But I also think it's a really healthy thing to do. So on Saturday, I went to the annual East Hampton artists and writers softball game, Speaker 3 (3:54) which has been going Speaker 2 (3:56) on. It's incredible. It's been going on since the 40s. It was started by Jackson Pollock and all of those kind of East End painters. And oh, my gosh, it was Carl Bernstein, Katie Couric, Christy Brinkley, Ken Auletta is the manager of the writers team. So it was it was a real scene. Speaker 3 (4:17) Oh, my God. I can't wait to to read your report on it. That's so fun. So I do want to give you a little bit of my Aspen retail report, but maybe I'll just do that at the top of the message. I haven't been to the Hamptons in, or, you know, I used to go to Orient because my sister-in-law had a place out there, but still, honestly, 10 years of that. And then the Hamptons, probably 15 years. It's been a long time. But did you grow up going to the Hamptons or did you, because I know you live out, out there full time now, but how did you end up there? Speaker 1 (4:57) What's your history? Speaker 2 (4:59) Yeah, I'm like 75 % of the time out here. We still have a place in the city and I go to LA a lot, but my daughter goes to school here. We live most of the time on Shelter Island. I so did not grow up coming out here. We lived in New Jersey and then Berkeley, California, and we had a scrappy little lake house in Pennsylvania. So this is not the way I grew up at all. I first started coming out here in 2010 when I moved back to New York from Paris. And I just had this sort of magical day in Montauk. I mean, that sounds sort of cheesy to say now. In 2010, Montauk still had that sort of bohemian, casual, barefoot vibe. So actually, the first day I came out to the Hamptons was the day I met my husband. And we drove out here together with... the photographer Sean Thomas and just spent this kind of incredible day going to Dury's before Dury's was private equity owned. And we went swimming at the beach and we went to a friend's trunk show at Surf Lodge, which honestly sounds unbearable now, but at the time it felt really fun. Yeah, so we spent several summers going out to Montauk and then bought a place in Shelter Island from Christian Langbein, former VP of Prada, who is now at BPCM. Speaker 3 (6:23) Shout out to Christian Langbein. And you two went to high school together or something, right? Elementary school. Elementary school. It's too good. And were you, did you, was it a sort of a COVID move that you ended up putting your kid in school there? Exactly. Speaker 2 (6:40) Yes. Speaker 2 (6:42) And then we stayed for several reasons, mainly because my daughter was really happy here. And she kind of turned into a nature kid who was sort of more comfortable climbing trees and being outside than being in the city. So, yeah. So how Speaker 3 (6:57) did the Hamptons Chronicle come about? Because you've been publishing since the beginning of the summer, right? Speaker 2 (7:05) Yes, we launched Memorial Day. I've had this idea a long time ago, you know, when you have one of those ideas that just sort of won't quit and it just keeps working on you in the background while you're doing other things. That was very much this. So my grandfather ran small town newspapers in northern Wisconsin, Eagle River. And I just, growing up with the stories of how he lived his life, like, you know, sitting at the local supper club and everyone's coming and whispering in his ear with gossip and, you know, stories and being able to go to all the local events and... I've always loved local news. I have local news in my blood. I follow a lot of small newspapers around the country. And I was actually always kind of scouring them for news for Wall Street Journal because we have this A-head section, which is this kind of feature fun column which runs on the front page. And it's sort of like a slice of local life a lot of the time. And a lot of my best ideas for... The A-head column came from local newspapers. So I wrote one about the fight over whether a topless beach should be allowed in Nantucket. And it was interesting because you could look at these stories as really small and kind of niche, but they would always get this big audience. So that sort of struck me as interesting. And I started writing more about the Hamptons for the Wall Street Journal. So I wrote about when Scott Sarchiano of Zero Bond tried to take over the Hedges Inn. That was sort of a longer investigative story that I did with my great colleague, Ellen Gammerman. I wrote about the jaw-dropping cost of a Hamptons Girls weekend. I wrote about the Hamptons boutique fitness scene. And even though those were sort of small-town stories, they always got a lot of pickup and a lot of interest. So I started to think, okay, there's something here. Speaker 2 (9:02) And there's a lot of great local press there. You know, the East Hampton Star is wonderful. The press, the Gazette, there are a lot of great daily newspapers. And then there are a lot of glossies like Hampton's Magazine, Spotlight, South Forker. But I felt like there was room for something in the middle that was sort of like an airmail, almost spy magazine, kind of mischievous local news that had some taste and some voice. Speaker 3 (9:28) Yeah, I I've been reading the sub stacks and since you launched that, but but you sent me the print issue and it I was just it's really, Speaker 2 (9:37) really good. Speaker 3 (9:38) Like it was exactly I read every single article. And I just it's funny, my husband was just in Sun Valley. So he brought back a bunch of local papers. And I guess local. I've been thinking, I always think a lot about local. news and journalism because I feel like that's the big unlock. If someone can figure out how to scale that, then we're all going to be saved. But it seems like in wealthy communities, it's still possible to fund these things. And Nantucket has a great local that I follow pretty closely because of all the retail that's happening there. And there were, I believe there were some issues that their Ralph Lauren store is there were in the Hamptons as well. But My husband was in Sun Valley, so we got a couple papers from there. And then I was in Aspen this past weekend, and there are two papers there and just reading through them. And what struck me about the Hamptons Chronicle is, A, like you said, taste. It has that sort of high-level person who has worked at national publications feeling to it, but also really small stories like that. financial writer who died, you did an item on that, or having Andrew Rosen pick his favorite places, former Fashion People guest. But the thing that I wanted to ask you, just reading through it. I find, I was just talking to some friends who went to Daniela Kallmeyer's wedding, which I assume you'll be covering this past weekend. And we were talking about the Jitney and how fun the Jitney is to ride out there. And you have this great story where you go on, you go from, I don't even know where, to the Hamptons on a four-hour bus ride. Speaker 2 (11:31) I took the local bus, which is the number 92, and it goes all the way from Orient Point down the North Fork to Riverhead and then all the way back out on the South Fork. So I did that as sort of crazy person prep for starting the project just because I'd always seen the 92 bus and been curious about it and sort of wondered who took it. I mean, of course, you can guess that it's. people that can't afford a car and need to get to their jobs. But I sort of sensed that there was more to it. And sitting on the bus and talking to people, you do get a lot of stories that are really interesting. Yeah, Speaker 3 (12:09) that's it's so great. So I think I guess the question for me is like, As I aged, I remember in 2010 when MomTalk was still cool. And I worked for Brandon Hawley at Lucky Magazine for a while and they had a place out there. And that was like 2011, 2012. And the older I got, the more... Speaker 3 (12:34) The idea of even going out there stressed me out. Like, I remember once I went out, a friend of mine rented a place and there was some Chanel event on a Saturday night. And I was just like, I can't like it was just like everywhere you go, you see someone, you know, and I'm reading through Katie Couric did a little feature. Well, it was actually pretty prominent. a Q &A with you for the first issue and all of the places she loves to go and all the things she loves to do. And I kept thinking like, because she says she's like, I'm not telling you which beach I go to because that's why I like going there. Why do people still go? It just feels so, Shelter Island where you live, that's special. I know that that's great. If the North