On Monday, Blake Lively’s sad little lifestyle site finally shut down. If a “curated” lifestyle site is a reflection of the curator, then we now know that Blake has a hazy affection for the antebellum South, especially old plantations, with slaves out toiling in the fields. That image is “alluring” to her, and that speaks volumes about Blake as a person. If you go to preserve.us, you’ll see that the shopping site has been replaced by one image of a lonely tree at sunset. Godspeed, lonely tree.
While no one is really mourning the death of Preserve, it’s especially telling that even Blake’s friends don’t seem all that sad about it. Blake has been pretty friendly with Martha Stewart for a few years now, even though Martha has thrown some gentle shade at Blake’s lifestyle attempts before. As Blake was launching Preserve, Martha was asked about it and she said: “Let her try. I don’t mean that facetiously! I mean, it’s stupid, she could be an actress! Why would you want to be me if you could be an actress?” Now that Preserve is done, Us Weekly went to Martha and they asked her thoughts about it:
“I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I know she made a big effort. Sometimes shuttering is good. Listen, she’s a movie actress. Why bother with commerce right now? She’s at the top of her career… I’m totally supportive, but you know what? Maybe you can’t do everything at the same time.”
I said once that Martha Stewart will bury all of these younger girls encroaching on her lifestyle territory. Do you believe me now? Martha Stewart is probably cackling as she sticks pins in her Gwyneth Paltrow voodoo doll. As for what Martha is actually saying… is it as harsh as I think it is? Because it came across as classic Martha, in that Martha is definitely throwing shade. “Listen, she’s a movie actress” = she’s pretty and not smart enough to run a lifestyle empire/business. “Maybe you can’t do everything at the same time” = Maybe YOU can’t do everything at the same time but Martha can. She will bury you.
Photos courtesy of WENN.
Wise advice.
And that is how you serve schadenfreude, cold, and on a chilled, curated, Wedgewood dish.
Yes!
This needs to be immortalized in cross stitch.
Martha is like a Bath and Bodyworks fragrance..”.Fall Shade a new scent that captures the elegant chill of apples and queen bit@h”…Never stop Martha-ing, Martha.
Ha! Sounds like the perfect candle* scent for my Halloween party!
*But only if I can buy them 2 for $24.
I work for Bath and Body Works, and you just made my week. Lmfao.
Except it would probably sound more like this:
“Fall Shade- a chilly and soul-crushing blend of crisp b!tch, swathed in notes of decadent hatred and sensual self-righteousness.”
😉
Shambles I feel so close to you! I am the customer who buys the candles en masse when there is a sale. You know, the annoying one you have to double bag for and even use the shipping holders for so the candles don’t move around the five bags I am carrying out. I just stocked up on Balsam this weekend.
I Light Fall Shade Candles for all My Cutting a Bitch’s Needs
Shambles, can you convince your higher-ups for a B&B Works presence in Europe? 😉
I do so miss that place!!! The Body Shop just can’t touch it ….
I know your kind very well, Mia 😉
You must be in heaven since they’ve been on sale every dang weekend this month.
Also, I am your kind. I’m not emotionally ready for Balsam yet, but I’m burning Flannel and a 3 layer pumpkin currently, with 2 Pumpkin Apples, a Pumpkin Pecan Waffles, a Vanilla Pumpkin Marshmallow, and a Marshmallow Fireside waiting on me. Jeez, it looks even worse when you type it. It’s truly a sickness. But also, FALL SMELLS. 😀
QQ, slaying it as always (see the far left candle cabinet for BITCH SLAY, a preview of our newest winter fragrance)
JOANEU, I’ll do what I can for you, sister.
Shamble: I would go with Summer’s YAAASSS KWEEEENN YAAASSS even in winter, it’s fruity you say, but I remind you I live in florida and I’m 100% tropical as well
OK so now I feel close to QQ too – I live in the 305!
Shambles – I stocked up on Balsam, but do not burn until Dec 1 (they just always sell out so quickly in Nov/Dec). Plus I hand then out to all my family at Thanksgiving as a “start of the season” marker.
And yes FALL SMELLS!! I’m burning Harvest Gathering and Leaves right now. (I’m a scent mixer)
Related, in my conversations with your colleagues I always have found it so interesting how some scents do much better in some regions of the country than others. Like here in tropical South Florida, Fresh Bamboo was really popular, but I heard that it is not such much so in Northeast for example.
Mia, would you be my official boo? Im in 561/954, yes you will!
Yep. Harsh as sandpaper. She meant every word of it.
Ah the lonely tree… Like the single tree that sprouts up at the end of the movie Wall-E, a sign of hope after the planet has been utterly destroyed by man-made disaster.
Lol. Very symbolic.
And yeah, Martha knows exactly what she’s saying.
I LOVE Wall-E, one of my all time favourites.
Thank you, Martha.
The shades are perfect, as usual: “Sometimes shuttering is good.”, “She’s at the top of her career…” – that’s the glorious one!
That’s really the best one. Top of her career! She knew exactly what she was saying.
@Alarive:
As Michael K (from Dlisted) would say: “the shade from it all…”
The “top of her career” was brilliant… I mean, if I was the reporter, I would have said, “yeah, Green Lantern, that Adaline thing. And also, may I kiss your ring, ms. Stewart?”
Hah, yes. She might as well have added; we know her looks is all she’s got, and they aren’t going to last!
Yeah, not even one lie from Martha… it’s all true and deliciously delivered. Ouch.
Martha is my forever GILF she throws all the so called most beautiful actresses outya water. Love…love..love..love..her
Martha is focused beyond compare. She sleeps four hours a night, for pete’s sake. She scares me.
Love it. The lifestyle site Queen beheading the would-be usurpers. Lots of shade today.
“She’s a movie actress…” Well…she’s been in movies, the jury is still out on the “actress” part. 😉
Martha is so gangsta. Curtsy or bow down.
In Martha’s defense, she didn’t just decide one day to get into the life style business on a lark. She started as a caterer while working on wall street, then slowly morphed into the lifestyle area with cookbooks, magazines and eventually TV and blog. Spent a little time in jail etc….what has Blake really done but “curate” a few items…not that there isn’t room at the top for more than one life style guru but it’s not something that just happens.
Exactly! She quit modelling and went into catering, which allowed her to build a customer base and great contacts in Manhattan – all that came in very handy when she started the magazine and the recipe books. And yes, she is a perfectionist and workaholic. I would never want her as a boss, but she really worked very hard to build her company. Nine of these lifestyle site owners /celebs have a clue.
I keep hearing that Goop is not making money, just wondering how it stays afloat? Someone must keep pumping cash into it. Why??? I on,y checked out the site once, and if eau de arrogance with a whiff of pretension is your thing, then great, that’s a good site to shop, but otherwise? No thanks. (And I do buy expensive brands like Bulgari and Cartier and Burberry, but I don’t need anyone to “curate” my sweaters and monogram my underwear for me, thanks.)
I think Gwen herself and investors are banking Goop.com. I believe that’s why her business partner and main investor left early this year because it not making any money.
Martha Stewart recently sold her company for a fraction of its previous worth. I don’t think she can deliver a blow to anybody anymore. She and Liveley are done.
“Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, an unprofitable lifestyle business founded by the do-it-yourself maven, is being sold for a near-clearance price.
Once valued at nearly $2 billion when it went public at the height of the dot-com boom, Martha Stewart Living MSO 0.33% is selling for a much smaller $353 million in a cash-and-stock deal to Sequential Brands Group SQBG 0.44% , which licenses and promotes a number of brands including items under pop star Jessica Simpson’s collection and Linens N Things.”
I don’t know what business-inept site you pulled that malarkey from, but bitch traded *up*, not down. First of all, *all* companies have fallen in value compared with the height of the dot-com boom. That’s….what made it the dot-com boom. Secondly, “Ms. Stewart herself will become a “significant stockholder” of a new public holding company of Sequential and Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia. She will also be nominated to serve on the company’s board. The deal is half cash, half stock.” That deal was just a business person, businessing,
At its peak, Martha Stewart’s media empire, built around her carefully curated and fussily decorated lifestyle brand, was worth well over $1 billion.
Yet on Monday, the company agreed to sell itself for a fraction of that.
Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia said that it would sell itself to the Sequential Brands Group, a conglomerate whose brands include Jessica Simpson and the Franklin Mint, for just $353 million.
It is in some ways a reminder of how far the company has fallen from its heights, when Ms. Stewart’s particular vision of a perfectly decorated lifestyle commanded attention and investor dollars.
The company was dealt a blow in 2004 when Ms. Stewart — a former stockbroker and model who discovered a lucrative knack for decorating and catering — was convicted of obstructing justice and lying about a well-timed stock sale, spending several months in prison in Alderson, W.Va.
Despite working under a temporary ban from holding an officer title at a publicly traded company, she eventually reclaimed the title of chairwoman of the company that bears her name.
But Martha Stewart Living has been battered by the troubles that have afflicted many media companies, as readers shifted to other titles and television shows. Last fall, the company struck a deal to license two of its main magazine titles to the Meredith Corporation, providing content for those publications.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/23/business/dealbook/martha-stewarts-media-empire-sold-for-fraction-of-its-former-value.html?_r=0
When Martha said, “she’s at the top of her career”, what she meant was, “Blake, it’s all downhill from here.”
I would never buy anything Martha, but I did read (free from the Local Library) all 3 major biographies about her. I know people might say she’s a fierce business woman, and that women have to be tough to get to the top. All true, but she really is not a “good” person. She did wrong by a lot of people, she misappropriated others’ intellectual property And misrepresented them as her own ideas in her line of books. She’s one who would cut out her own mother if it meant a nice profit for herself.
…and her recipes suck, to boot. Way overcomplicated–and unless you buy all her high-end ingredients, the results are for crap.
I do not take to Blake Not So Lively. But, Martha where is the mentoring? Support of other women. Did anyone tell you that you couldn’t do it all. And even if they did, did it stop you? Where is the support for other women, Martha???
Martha is the Cersei in the Lifestyle Game of Table Settings. Don’t even try to usurp this bitch from the head of the table!
I don’t mind Blake and other than that dumb Antebellum crap I felt Preserve was just another silly venture celebs do besides their main career. But…
“Thank you for sharing your stories and preserving with us”
Sharing stories? What stories?! It was a flappin’ online catalogue of overpriced stuff for crying out loud.
“Sharing stories? What stories?! It was a flappin’ online catalogue of overpriced stuff for crying out loud.”
I guess when someone’s PA called customer service to report the cashmere & bamboo fiber moisturizing gloves were delivered two hours late, she bravely shared her epic saga of anticipation and betrayal with some poor phone rep.
Monumentalizing the trivial and the mundane in an offensive format – with barely concealed winks at purity and simplicity and whatever the hell they like to tout as authenticity – is the only real commodity ventures like this have to offer other self-dramatising flowers.
beautiful!
OHHHHHHHHHH Skippy! I love a good side eye soup, with a dash of smile, a sprinkle of f**k you and a whole lotta shade!
And Blake Lively? Is she really a movie actress or a one hit TV actress who dos movies sometimes, and she’s married to a some time famous type husband?
I dunno, I love Martha. Buuut. When we have Justin Timberlake buying and trying to save MySpace, and Ashton appearing on Shark Tank, we laud them for being do it all businessmen. When women do it, they should just stick to acting? No. There’s nothing wrong with diversifying income and trying to build your brand. At the top of her career is exactly when one *should* be starting the ol’ “aged out of Hwood” backup plan.
Yep, I agree.
There might have been some sexism but Preserve was a bit frivolous and overpriced whereas stuff like MySpace, whether you like that type of social media thing or not, is more of a real service that everyone can use, even if they don’t have a huge household/clothing budget. And Ashton Kutcher, as brain-dead as he appears, is apparently quite a successful investor. I do think most of the criticism against Blake wasn’t so much sexist as due to the fact that her items were a bit out of reach for the average person. Especially that crate.
I don’t think Martha is who we turn to expecting support and encouragement towards other women. Read any bio about her and she comes across as selfish and cutthroat including to her own family. This is kind of expectant from her.
Martha Stewart does not have friends; she has acquaintances and business contacts. Please look up commentary on her foreword(s) for the Barefoot Contessa’s book(s). Sociopath and it’s not sexist. You can be a strong woman without those constant backhanded compliments. She’s also unethical (see her insider trading thing).
Martha will always be my favourite G.
Poor Blake. She’s just got that crazy bout new baby lazy going on, and realized she didn’t want to sacrifice any of that time on the pretentious foolishness that was Preserve.
Shade all the way, geez a lot of folks will toast when her next bout of issues hit her.