Elle
Of all the well-known fashion and lifestyle magazines, Elle has undoubtedly taken the Internet most to heart. Impeccably designed and with all the features of the print version intact, this is everything an online magazine should be and more. It's all there; fashion, of course, but also beauty, cuisine, decor, right down to the obligatory horoscopes, the articles updated on a weekly basis.
Again similarly to the print-edition, certain areas such as health are limited in scope and you'd probably be better served by one of the more specialised portals. When it comes to pure fashion however there are few better places to turn to; access to the collections is excellent by way of an image-rich searchable presentation. For current seasons and shows, this is eclipsed in depth and breadth by Vogue's US site (see bellow) which however lacks the past collections accessible here.
Elle.com is the main and most comprehensive US-centric version but with 13 other country-links to choose from, wherever you hail from it's a winning combination.

Changes Live
This is one of the more serious beauty sites out there. International surfers shouldn't let the UK origins frighten them off, there's plenty here of use to everyone, whether you are after a completely new look or a simple piece of advice. By no means the only such facility on the web, the most fascinating section is certainly the beauty studio that lets you upload a photo and then play with the latest hair and makeup styles.
But the magazine is where you'll find the more in depth information with a fresh and natural approach to the subject lacking on many of the more jazzy sites and those of the big cosmetics manufacturers. The various speciality areas from which the contributors are drawn attests to the quality of the advice. Of course there are the usual commercial overtones, but certainly no more than you might expect and the online shopping area has plenty to offer. The design is pleasing and though not the simplest site to navigate at first, the structure quickly begins to makes sense.

Glamour
For the more teenagey and frivolous side of beauty and fashion you can always rely on Glamour. Whereas the US site is for some reason, little more than a teaser to get you to run out and buy the mag, its UK cousin offers an altogether more seductive surfing experience. There may not be much by way of actual article content but with plenty of clever and cute little quizzes, games, contests there's enough here to keep the most demanding of glamour-girls satisfied. You can vote on the latest faux-pas of your favourite celeb and disentangle all the do's and don'ts of glamourdom. There's also gossip galore and fortunately little of the farcical and crude consumerism of Cosmopolitan's endless lessons of sexiquette. The lively design helps to emphasise the obvious and well-thought out brief of the site to be a simple and fun plug for the magazine.

Vogue
Vogue's US site has been cleverly located inside style.com which acts as a general fashion portal and more significantly a designer apparel boutique. You'll need the Flash plugin to appreciate the fine display and navigation effects and its well-worth waiting for everything to load. As you can rightly expect you are then suitably ensconced in a true temple of haute couture. There are plenty of good fashion sites on the web, some with interesting if overambitious ideas, like virtualrunway.com that lets you view clips of the shows if you have a fast enough connection, but in the end it is still the adaptations of traditional print-magazines that have the edge. Style.com is part of Advance publication's Conde Nast empire that owns many of the well-known fashion magazines, it follows that coverage of the collections and the all mundane goings on in the world of fashion is unbeatable with the quality of the articles second to none and masses of photo's to back them up. What is however missing from this site is an archive of past Vogue issues like the one offered by Vogue UK which is also well worth a visit even if its 640x480 display is in desperate need of a redesign.