Everyone says 'yes' to NO AGENCY.
An interview with New York's most interesting modeling agency.
Good morning everyone. I’m back in New York.
Today’s letter includes a fun interview with the team behind NO AGENCY, whose new print issue of NO EROTICA includes Julie Schott, Hari Nef, and yours truly.
The letter also includes: a tip from
about a new bar on Canal Street (with a controversial owner), some real signals that tanning is back, hotels are turning into billboards, and Carbone thinks you wants their pasta at concerts.And a weekend poll (feel free to discuss in the comments):
When I first learned that No Agency was charging $100 for their baseball hats back in 2023, I liked them. Their approach to business is a little naughty — they’re part agency, part publisher, part consultancy. Their clients include Miu Miu, Nike, SKIMS and Glossier, and their talent roster includes rising stars like Alice McNally (daughter of Keith).
The most public-facing project they work on is a limited-edition publication called NO EROTICA. I spoke to Alexander Tsebelis, co-founder of No Agency, this week. He answered my questions via voice note because he was driving through Faenza, a city south of Bologna, where the agency’s printer is located. The new issue will ship later this month.
NO EROTICA issue 5 is here. How young we all were back in 2022 when the first one launched. What have you learned over the years about making zines while working on this publication?
NO AGENCY’S Alexander Tsebelis and Chloe Mackey: “NO EROTICA started as an accident. We were doing the NO AGENCY newsletter, which became our first book — we’d print 100 copies a month. It was absolutely hellish to put together, but ultimately, a lot of fun. While working on the Vacation Issue, so many of our friends sent us nudes as their contribution that our printer said that it was too many pages and he couldn't staple it together. We found this out while we were in the office and our friend Connor was there and she was like, You guys should just do an insert, a whole separate thing. And that’s how this started.
I think like what we've learned throughout this process is that printing outside of the United States is cheaper. Our margins have gotten much better. We're able to gauge timing and budgets more effectively. And we've built the best lingerie collection I've seen, personally, in the process.”
“The thing that can't really be replicated at larger agencies is our relationship with the talent. Our talent, our photographers, everyone we work with is genuinely our friend — we know what they like.”