Yes, I know this is not magazine related, but Puffin Books are 70 this year, and they have commissioned six artists/designers to choose a favourite book from their childhood, and illustrate the cover. Probably not one for the kids this, as they retail at £100 a shot, but if you fancy getting your hands on The Secret Garden illustrated by Lauren Child, or Little Women by Orla Kiely, then they go on sale on 2 September. With only 1,000 copies of each being printed, these are sure to be very collectable. If you don’t have £100, then try this competition on Vogue.com to win one.
With Tesco about to enter the consumer magazine market, I’m thinking Waitrose may not be far behind.
Take these offerings in print from a recent visit to the upmarket supermarket chain. Waitrose Kitchen, now up to issue two, doing what I thought Waitrose Food Illustrated was supposed to do. Then a tabloid newspaper called Waitrose Weekend, with the future king on the front. Most people would happily pay £3 for Waitrose Kitchen, it’s as good as any commercial food mag out there, but it’s only a quid – and free to John Lewis card holders!
I guess the winners are companies like ours – CMYK – who are happy to publish magazines on other people’s behalf if the price is right. John Brown do all the Waitrose titles, having successfully sold their ailing Food Illustrated title to them some years back. Looks like a newly founded company Catmags Communications will be producing the magazines for Tesco. Not sure why the supermarkets don’t do what Jamie Oliver did, and start their own publishing company. Only a matter of time I guess.
And I thought Loaded had closed! IPC Media, who own the title have managed to sell it to Vitality, who produce Attitude. Let’s see what they do with it. Check out this set of classic Loaded covers from over the years.
This story reminded me of a 1996 Loaded spin-off – Eat Soup – a lad’s mag about, er, food. Needless to say, it didn’t last long. Wonder if IPC Media still own the rights to the name…
Why it’s cool to cook, by Michael Caine
This is more like the Loaded we know. A feature on cannibalism!
Then a more straightforward piece on foodstops on Route 66.
Well, Vintage at Goodwood is over now, but I did enjoy searching out prime examples of vintage British magazines to reflect the decades. I said I would put up some spreads, so here they are.
I love this one from Ideal Home from the sixties. An interview with Liberty window dresser, Roy Gentry. Is his home as nice as his window displays?
More from Ideal Home.
Great one from Oz in the seventies about drug misuse, with illustrations from the “lovely” Peter Till.
Another from Oz, and an article from the late, great John Peel.
Up to the eighties now, and Blitz.
Some fashion from Blitz. It’s all coming back I’m told!
See earlier post for the covers.
So, Vintage at Goodwood kicks off today, and our trip down magazine memory lane comes to an end in the 80s, with a copy of Blitz magazine.
Wrongly accused as a pale imitation of The Face, Blitz was a great reflection of the time, as this Frankie Goes to Hollywood cover testifies. First published in 1980, the magazine closed in 1991. This issue is from 1984, the year I moved to London to study design at the London College of Printing. Blitz, the Face and ID magazines were all very much part of my life then. Looking through this copy, I am amazed at the amount of mono pages – we just take full colour printing for granted now. Jeremy Leslie took over the design soon after this issue, and he now writes one of the best magazine blogs around – magculture.com
Enjoy Vintage at Goodwood! I will post up some spreads later from the magazines featured throughout the week.
Nearly there. Vintage at Goodwood starts tomorrow, and our countdown of magazine covers through the decades continues with Oz from 1972.
This is the fifth anniversary issue, and the list of contributors is amazing: John Peel, Auberon Waugh, Robert Crumb and Peter Till. Sadly, the magazine was on a downward spiral, having been through the courts on an obscenity charge which became the longest in legal history (for the time). Felix Dennis, one of the men behind Oz came out reasonably unscathed, forming Dennis Publishing in the eighties and tapping into the new computer market. Today, Dennis talks of its publications as “brands” rolling them out as franchises in different countries and also online.
Last vintage post tomorrow – and it’s the eighties. Plus, a sneaky look inside some of the magazines.
We continue our countdown to Vintage at Goodwood on Friday, and today is the turn of the sixties.
Homes and furniture was a massive part of the 1960s, with new designers like Charles Eames and Terence Conran shaping the way people lived. Ideal Home magazine was one of the biggest selling titles at the time. Published since the twenties, it is still around today, and recently had a redesign. Some of the furniture in this issue from October 1964 wouldn’t look out of place in today’s copy!
