To celebrate the partnership, the brand hosted an event at their store with Substack during Cannes Lions, where it had French novelist Pauline Klein, fashion author Plum Sykes and international Substack head Farrah Storr host a panel on how brands can support artistry, creativity and deep thinking across Substack. “Today, evidence of genuine interest and lasting affinities holds more weight than broad, instant appeal,” the brand added.
Patronage also doesn’t necessarily need to begin with grand cultural ambitions. Salazar argues that brands can start with the people and the communities around them. “We’ve kind of gone too big picture. If you just zoom in, if you can have an immediate local impact on your surroundings, that becomes like a domino effect that can billow out and be impactful,” she says. “We shouldn’t be carried away with trying to save the world. If you can make your corner of the world nice, that’s really impactful as well.”
Sometimes, that can be as simple as paying people fairly. “Start off by paying the creatives and the talent that you work with at a competitive rate that’s actually indicative of market value, and actually uphold them and value them in the same way that they’re adding value to you,” Salazar adds.
It can also be recognizing and platforming those working in creative roles that don’t often gain visibility. Outlander magazine recently shared a post spotlighting its first-ever intern, Caira Coleman, with the caption: “We wanted to use our platform to shine a light on a role that goes by too fast in this industry and one that’s often overlooked, but is actually one of the most important beginnings of a career.” In the carousel, Coleman was interviewed about what she learned during the internship; the post went on to receive more than 6,400 likes.
This new patron proposition comes at a time when a fresh crop of cultural happenings are emerging across London, from the Soho Reading Series, consisting of literary events founded by Tom Willis, to Singing With My Friends, the karaoke night that’s become a fixture of the city’s fashion crowd.
“In the end, the things that are made without an intent to commercialize really quickly always feel way more exciting,” says music and cultural journalist Shaad D’Souza, who last year turned his Instagram account into Shaad Magazine, a bet on the continued appetite for writing in a struggling media landscape. “It is crazy to think what a brand could get from giving a tiny amount of their money to someone who could do great things with it,” he says. “The reason a lot of brands are failing is that they can’t connect with that ineffable thing that people are seeking. The only way to get that is to forge these relationships.”
Ultimately, patronage is about brands adopting a different mindset: taking a step back from culture rather than always trying to put themselves at the center of it, while recognizing that value isn’t always about the brand’s own creative vision, but in giving someone else the resources to pursue theirs. That doesn’t mean brands have to be altruistic, or that the relationship stops being commercially useful, patronage has always involved an exchange of value. The starting difference is believing that culture is worth supporting in its own right, instead of being something to exploit for relevance.