The first issue of the new Different Leaf has just been published, a complete reinvention of the US magazine first launched in 2019 in response to the liberalisation of cannabis laws in parts of the country.

Originally positioned as a lifestyle guide for cannabis users, founder Michael Kusek—a familiar figure on the US indie scene—has reinvented his magazine to look more broadly at how cannabis influences culture and how culture influences cannabis. With a new editorial structure featuring guest editors and themed issues, Different Leaf is far more ambitious, and better aligned with current indie ideas of physical presence and collectability. Michael introduces the new magazine as he shares his working week and influences.

What are you doing this morning?
I’m working out some circulation logistics as this issue leaves our printer and building out a guest list for a dinner we’re planning in Provincetown, Massachusetts in honor of our guest editors for this issue, Nick Cave and Bob Faust. Just your typical day of trying to nail down some RSVPs while simultaneously trying to figure out where the hell UPS has your packages.

Describe your work environment
I’ve worked out of an office in my home for the last twenty years so my commute has always been incredibly short. The biggest thing that has changed as far as my daily routine is I moved out of my apartment in downtown Northampton, Massachusetts to a house in a small town of a few hundred people about 30 miles west.

My home is now in the woods so looking out my window from my desk I see far more trees and wildlife (Groundhogs, often. Bears, occasionally.) than I did when I lived in the center of a small city. If you can manage it, having a river in your backyard that you can hear running will do wonders for your sanity.

Which magazine do you first remember? 
National Geographic. My aunt Helena would visit every Thursday night and would bring a brown shopping bag full of magazines to pass along to my mother. There were always tons of women's magazines like Good Housekeeping and Woman’s Day in the pile but there was also National Geographic which really opened my eyes to the world. When I was eight or nine Helena gave me a subscription to National Geographic World, their version for children, and I had for many years until I outgrew it.

Aside from yours, what’s your favourite magazine? 
I am a magazine omnivore. It's so hard to pick favorites from the past or the present. I think Interview changed the way I viewed pop culture when I first found it in high school. In college I discovered The Face and my politics was shaped by reading the queer newsweekly Outlook. Post-college I got really into design magazines with Nest and Wallpaper dominating my reading. These days I’m endlessly fascinated by what Fantastic Man does, and I make sure to buy every copy of Acne Paper when it comes out.

What other piece of media would you recommend? 
Since I moved into the country I do a fair bit more driving than I did when I lived in the middle of a city so podcasts have become a big part of my media diet these days. I am absolutely smitten with anything that Avery Truffleman does on her podcast ‘Articles of Interest’ and I always eagerly listen to anything to come out from Rachel Maddow. I’m always looking for recommendations from friends and colleagues for new sources of information and entertainment as I consciously try to move away from stuff fed to me by an algorithm.

Describe Different Leaf in three words.
Informative. Immersive. Collectible!

Issue five of Different Leaf, from 2020

The magazine launched seven years ago to address the new legal cannabis market in the US. Talk us through that initial launch.
Prior to Different Leaf I published a regional arts magazine covering the New England states called Take. As that was winding down, Massachusetts voters legalised cannabis at the ballot. After  a chance conversation with a friend who is in the industry where we started talking about the potential impacts of legalisation on the state, I began to wonder what magazines were out there (beyond High Times, which was the only one I knew). I drove to a bookstore and bought the few cannabis magazines I could find. I saw a space for a magazine that could provide reliable information to readers who were going to try cannabis for the first time or might be coming back to it now that it was legal.

Fortunately, I was connected to leaders in the legalisation movement in Massachusetts who were kind enough to introduce me around, giving me the chance to do some very informal market research. When I told people I was starting a magazine that would cover Massachusetts the response was positive enough for me to work seriously on creating a new title. Over five years we went from covering Massachusetts to covering the region to looking all of North America.


What led to the new twist in editorial direction?
There are many things that sort of prompted the new change in editorial direction but I think the two main things are first the state of constant regulator upheaval in the cannabis industry. It's a very legally complex industry to participate in here in the United States. There are few to no national regulations for legal cannabis. Where it is legal it is governed by state-by-state crafted regulations so you end up with a real patchwork across the country.

That most certainly makes it hard to operate if you are trying to sell the actual plant but it also presents a challenge to sell advertising on a national level. The second is a real desire by myself and a lot of the writers and creatives I work with to hone in on covering the culture around cannabis that we felt was the most interesting and richest area to explore. When Different Leaf first started there was scattered coverage of the cannabis industry and cannabis products in the mainstream press. For instance, local newspapers weren’t discussing the merits of various products for forms of consumption in a non-judgemental way. 

As legalisation picked up steam, the mainstream media started publishing more of the kind of coverage we were doing. With them becoming less squeamish about covering the how-tos of cannabis consumption, then there was a real opportunity for us to explore how cannabis influences culture and how culture influences cannabis and to move away from the new edible of the month coverage. This new format really opens us up to looking at many topics so there is a possibility we could branch out away from cannabis after we complete the first series of three issues.


Talk us through three different editions of the new issue
As a longtime fan of Visionaire I have admired the magazine's creativity and wanted to take my stab at creating something as collectable as they did. I also wanted to build in some accessibility in cover price so we could reach the broadest number of readers and fans of Nick and Bob's work. 

To achieve that I decided we would publish in three formats that would increase in complexity along with their price. Our soft cover magazine is our most widely distributed format that is heading out to newsstands and will retail for $40US. The next is the a hard cover edition limited to 500 copies at $100US followed by an Artist Edition that is boxed with two accessories: a rolling tray designed by Nick & Bob with a silk eye mask for sleeping that is adorned with illustrations by Laurène Boglio. That edition is limited to 225 copies and retails for $1000US. Subsequent issues will come with other smoking accessories designed by their guest editors. 

Highlight one story from the latest issue that sums up the new issue and explain why you selected it.
Obviously, they are all my favourites. LOL.  One of the more exciting things about this new format is working with guest editors and issue curators. The visual artists Nick Cave and Bob Faust led the selection of all of the articles that we did in this issue and they have crafted something that is very editorially different than I would have done. That has been the joy of working with them.

I don't think I can pick a favourite but I can definitely pick one that sort of encapsulates what this new iteration of the magazine is capable of: it's the new short story by Jonathan Lethem that tells the tale of Mr Karen, a character created by Nick and Bob, who starts as an illustration and eventually comes to life in the form of Broadway legend André de Shields. You’ll have to read the issue for the whole crazy story about how it all came together.


What has publishing taught you that may be helpful to anybody else planning to make their own magazine?
Spend as much time as you can with people who make magazines. Listen to and be encouraged by their successes and especially hear their cautionary tales. If you can get to them, go to gatherings of magazine people when they happen. Being in a room full of people who know your struggles will change the way you do your daily work and it will fill you up with new ideas and energy.


What are you most looking forward to this coming week?
I have some vacation time this week (poor planning on my part given everything that is going on) that will give me a chance to both ponder and think about the next issue but also to turn my brain off for a few hours. 

Design Lily Pereira and Zoe Pappenheimer

differentleaf.com