MAGCULTURE.COM / BLOG

Desktop publishing

Imagine what a group of editors, contributors and designers of mainstream magazines might create if they clubbed together to launch their own title. Now delete that. Whatever that description brings to mind will be completely different to Manzine, a new publication from an ad hoc group of just such people (GQ, Arena, Maxim etc). This monochrome magazine contains a random mix of content loosely linked to the idea ‘A Publication About the Male Phenomenon’.

So we get a short history of man in the media age (the new lad, toxic bachelor, etc); a rant in favour of rain; an investigation of celebrity nightlife; a piece about the emergence of hi-visibility clothing. All interesting enough, but perhaps not compelling as a set. Mixed among these serious if sometimes ironic pieces are the kind of throwaway cartoons and graphic elements last seen in Carlos magazine – ‘Two pints of Lagerfeld and a packet of crisps please’, and ‘Manzine Design Classics No.1’, featuring the Welsh mountain Tryfan.

What makes Manzine interesting is the way it’s design, described as desktop publishing on the flannel panel. This publication is defiantly lo-fi, being printed black and white on a basic uncoated paper stock at A4 size. It’s more fanzine-like than many actual current fanzines. There’s no regular grid, the fonts and type sizes are all over the place, with irregular drop caps at the start of articles and no workable navigation. This is contrived un-design, and just about convinces, but every now and then there’s a knowing nod to design (one story is designed as if it’s a page from the New Yorker). It makes the new ugly of Super Super and 032c look highly worked.

As something created in the evenings away from the day jobs it’s clearly a useful pressure release for those involved, but the design is much more resolved than the content. The overall concept pleases in a pub-idea kind of way, the design matches that concept, and the core parts – the cover, the self-descriptions (‘Interests & Pursuits – Thrills & Perils – Working & Going Out’) – are spot on. But the writing is hit and miss. Where it hits, it is enjoyably arch. My favourite feature is the shop review of hardware store Clerkenwell Screws, but ‘Better Living Through Knitwear’ left me cold.

Issue one has been discreetly available around London for a few weeks, and apparently the response has been good enough for a second issue to be started (i-D have even borrowed the title Manzine for their latest issue). We’ve all had pub conversations about launching our own magazine – these guys have gone and done it. I’m looking forward to issue two.

See the whole of issue one here.