Honest Thoughts on Print + A New Approach

Ever since I can remember I have hoarded stacks upon stacks of magazines. If you have read ROSE & IVY for a while, you might know that I started collecting them in college because I found great joy in flipping through the pages to get inspired. When I started ROSE & IVY as a digital publication, I aways wanted to do a print version, even though I knew that the tide was against me and that there are two sides to the argument of printed magazine. One side loves print and only print will only do, the other is very scared of print and if you say that five letter word, they (brands) run away scared for their life.

We have accomplished a lot by the small production that we did do to our printed version—we won many accolades including best in print and a runner-up in a national competition. We entered into Barnes & Noble, a move at the time I thought was good—oh wow, the biggest bookstore in the US reached out to us (!!) they want to carry the magazine (!!)—print forever! I have learned a lot and realized that this wasn’t the right channel and since this was a huge store, they don’t work with you so I decided to exit that agreement.

Sadly the print world has changed and if I am being honest, I haven’t looked at a magazine other than R&I in six months, maybe more. Looking at magazines makes me feel depleted and uninspired, the exact opposite of how they used to make me feel. I think this is why print is almost dead, especially in the U.S. Printing ROSE & IVY costed a lot of money, it’s because I wanted to be the opposite of what you find on the newsstand—nice paper, a silk cover, a gold foil logo—I wanted to make looking through our pages an experience. It’s what so many of the former great publications used to do before it became okay and the norm to keep putting the same people on every cover and telling the same story over and over again.

For the time being, I have decided to push pause and recalibrate what our print issue will look like. I often ask myself why I decided to get involved in an industry that has completely lost its way. When did quality and talent fall to the wayside? I still believe in the value of holding something versus looking at a screen all of the time. Does anyone else’s eyes and fingers hurt from always looking and holding their phone? I know mine do. If you purchased a copy of Journal No.11 we have issued a refund. We love our devoted print readers and we will be revisiting it again soon. We hope you can enjoy the digital edition in the same fashion. Thank you for your continued support of ROSE & IVY as we continue to carve out a unique space in the media world, one that is both intentional and beautiful.