Image: Jocks & Nerds
Image: Jocks & Nerds
With all things, one must adapt or die, and so it was that countless print magazines shuttered their doors over the past decade. Yet there are those publication that continue in this new world, finding a new way to reach the dedicated readers once again. Print is Dead. Long Live Print: The World’s Best Independent Magazines (Prestel) by Ruth Jamieson presents nearly 100 of the best print-reinventing indie magazines from around the world organized into chapters including Art & Culture, Design, Travel, Men’s & Women’s, Food & Drink, Sports, Life, Current Affairs, and Style. Each entry is given one, sometimes two, full page spreads printed on black matte and using knockout white text to most delicious effect.
Image: Anorak
As Jamieson writes in the book’s introduction, “For this new generation of publishers, with their emphasis on high production values and original concepts and content, their curiosity and reader-first mentality, there is a new covenant at the heart of magazine making…. It’s affordable way to mass produce a beautiful object. Tellingly, indie mags are not just sold on newsstands but also in clothing, interiors, and concept stores. These magazines are an affordable way to buy into a brand or lifestyle or to indulge a passion, much like a bottle of No. 5 is an affordable way to take home some Chanel.”
Image: Lucky Peach
Indeed, this approach to art in the age of digital reproduction has rendered many a magazine a collector’s item. Print is Dead. Long Live Print features the best of the best, the magazines that will make you excited about the possibilities of print once again, including magazines such as mono.kultur, Wrap, SUITCASE, Cherry Bombe, Lucky Peach, Huck, Apartamento, COLORS, and Fantastic Man, among others. Each entry includes a company bio and statement from the founder, providing a context by which to consider each magazine as a singular vision in independent publishing today.
Image: Apartamento
As Rob Orchard, co-founder of Delayed Gratification, reveals that when the magazine launched in 2011, “We wanted to champion print because, at the time, everybody was saying print was dead and we were watching numerous publications go downhill. Lots of bigger print titles were trying to be more like the Internet—more disposable, with lower production values and shorter features. We decided to go the other way: if you’re going to do print, do it properly. That means high-quality production and lovely paper stock that feels, smells, and looks good. It means investing in content and making something genuinely want.”
Indeed, this is the pleasure of purchasing and collecting print: it is the ability to return time and again to the same volume for the pleasure of a fresh review, for great work has the ability to increase and expand its significance through the benefit of time. Print is Dead. Long Live Print.
Miss Rosen is a New York-based writer, curator, and brand strategist. There is nothing she adores so much as photography and books. A small part of her wishes she had a proper library, like in the game of Clue. Then she could blaze and write soliloquies to her in and out of print loves.
