Stack Magazines

Nancy Heley is the editor and creative director of Sandweegies magazine, and she has a passionate love for print, and food, and her adopted home of Glasgow. In this episode she explains how one transcendent chicken sandwich led to a magazine idea, and how it's fast growing beyond its original remit.

Austė Skrupskytė Cullbrand is creative director and editor of Playground magazine, the independent publication that fills its pages with stories about creativity and the creative industries. Based between Lithuania and Sweden, the magazine has always had a Nordic / Baltic character, but it's evolving fast, and leaning further into its regional identity as a way to stand out on international newsstands. In this conversation, Austė shares her thoughts on the magazine's progress so far, and the creative community they are building.

Andy Crysell is editor of No Way Back, an archive publishing project that looks back at music and subcultures of the late 20th century, republishing stories from the music press to show how people experienced key turning points in the moment. It would be easy for No Way Back to slide into fond nostalgia, but instead of distant wistfulness, the magazine's main currency is the immediacy of its writing. Dipping into a story from The Face in 1986, or Rolling Stone in 1979, the reader is carried along on the energy and excitement of the moment, rather than ruminating on what it all means decades later. In this episode, Andy speaks about the ideas behind the project, and his ideas of where it will go next.

Editorial directors Kathryn Tann and Robert Harries share their thoughts on the first year of running Folding Rock, the literary magazine that publishes "new writing from Wales and beyond".

Chris Hassell and Josh Jones created Ralph magazine to swim against the digital tide. In this conversation they explain how they were inspired by the chaotic fun of pop culture magazines from the 90s, and why they decided to make a magazine that's guided by creativity and joy.

The latest issue of Debris opens its editorial on an uncompromisingly negative note: "It's the time of no. No war, no genocide, no corporatism, no big business, no oligarchies, no neo-feudalism, no rapacious plunder of land, no capitulation, no phone, no imperialism, no capital, no future." Editors Cher Tan and Jon Tjhia, and founder Julia Flaster speak about their aims with the magazine, and how saying no, "could possibly mean yes to something else".

Hear our independent magazine show, recorded live at St Bride Foundation on Thursday 5 February, and featuring stories from The Fence, Die Quieter Please, Dispatch and Piscine

Hillary Brenhouse is editor-in-chief and publisher of Elastic magazine, and Meara Sharma is senior editor, and in this conversation they describe their new approach to psychedelic art and writing. Playing with time and space, and dissolving the conventional lines between genres, they have produced a magazine of, "the ordinary, only slightly, weirdly, off".

Tom Parr is editor of Carrier, the magazine that tells, "the human stories behind the cargo bike". All the magazines we work with on Stack are niche to some extent, but Carrier digs in deeper than most, representing the cargo bike community to the wider world, and presenting them as altruistic innovators who are working to bring about positive change.

Chris Harrigan is editor of The Story, a publication that launched in 2025 as a literary magazine with a difference. As its name suggests, it’s fascinated by stories and storytelling, and in its pages writers and artists explore the meaning of what they do. They ask why we need to tell stories, how they manifest in such different ways, and why writing can be so bloody difficult sometimes. In this conversation, Chris speaks about the ideas and ideals that motivated him and his colleagues to launch the magazine in print.

New Papers is the literary magazine that's meant to be performed as well as read. Each issue launches with a recital, in which the entire magazine is read in order on stage at the Rose Lipman Hall in Hackney. In this episode, editor Colton Karpman and art director Dilara Koz speak about the ideas behind their publishing and performance project.

Laura Frade is managing editor of Apartamento, one of the world's best known and most beloved independent magazines. As the publication turns 18 years old, I spoke to her about the secrets of its enduring success.

Hear from all the independent magazines we delivered from July to December this year, featuring Hotshoe, Troublemakers, Not Here to Make Friends, Cake Zine, Off Licence and Beneficial Shock!

Rob Orchard is co-editor of Delayed Gratification, the magazine that launched 15 years ago with the bright idea of using the slowness of print as an advantage. Rather than racing to be first with the news, they dedicate each issue to a three-month period and reflect on events after the dust has settled. In this conversation he reflects on what he and the team have learned from publishing 60 issues of the magazine, including the constant battle with deadlines; the changing demands of social media; and the advantages of advertising on the Underground.

As we come to the end of the year, we're looking back at all the independent magazines we delivered to our subscribers in 2025. This first part covers our deliveries from January to June, and it features the people who make Broadcast from Brooklyn, Solomiya from Kyiv, Skin Deep from London, New York Review of Architecture from New York (of course), Playground from Vilnius and Stockholm, and No One from Amsterdam.

Charles Emmerson is the editor of Translator, the magazine that searches for great stories from beyond the Anglosphere, and translates them into English. In this conversation he speaks about the art of translation, the important decisions that have to be made along the way, and how his magazine is helping English speakers to better understand the world.

Sophie Barshall is editor of The Toe Rag, the free arts magazine distributed at independent and not-for-profit venues across London and beyond. In this conversation she speaks about the importance of arts coverage, the dire state of arts funding in the UK, and why The Toe Rag is not a passion project.

Melissa Goldstein and Natalia Rachlin are the founders and editors of Mother Tongue magazine, which presents a distinctly grown-up picture of motherhood. Disillusioned by the type of media that was presented to them as mothers, they began, "to poke holes in all the things that exist or have existed historically in this space. Why do they look a certain way and speak a certain way that just doesn't connect to us personally? And surely we can't be the only ones." In this episode they speak about the process of defining a new picture of motherhood, and building a sustainable business out of that initial disillusionment.

Mark Blacklock and Roderick Stanley are the editors of Offal, a self-proclaimed "haggis of literary culture", created from odd and experimental bits of text that don't quite fit anywhere else. It's a brilliantly anarchic print magazine and digital audio title, and in this conversation they speak about their interest in AI tools, explaining how they push them to glitch and break, sifting through the artistic and aesthetic potential of what remains.

Réiltín Ní Aodhagáin and Lilou Angelrath are the editors of Mnemotope, a literary magazine that looks beyond the publishing industry's usual niches in its search for a new type of storytelling. In this episode they speak about their radically open approach, winning design awards without knowing the rules of graphic design, and how beer mats help them to attract submissions from a different sort of writer.

Recorded live at Indiecon 2025, eight independent publishers speak about their magazines and other projects. Featuring Sebastian Wells from Solomiya, Timothy Frazier from Photographic Bandwidth, Sotiris Trechas from Fluffer Everyday, Oliver Gabe from The Paper, Yuto Miyamoto from Troublemakers, Pang Xue Qiang from Meantime, and Anja Charbonneau from Broccoli.

Recorded at the Indie Publisher Summer Forum in Amsterdam, this episode features a panel discussion on the role of branding in independent magazines. Featuring Damian Bradfield from WeTransfer and Fupe, Megan Wray Schertler from In Real Life Media, and Peter Kormanyos from Purgatory Sandwich, it begins with the question of what branding is, and how small, print magazines can use it to punch above their weight.

Erin Mathias, Oliver Gabe, and Owen Davies are the editors of The Paper, the big, funny, dark magazine from Wales. In this conversation they speak about their love of extreme contrasts, and why they don't give readers room to breathe.

Nicola Hamilton is the founder of Issues, the Toronto magazine shop that opened in the city's West End in 2022. In this episode she speaks about her love for print, and how she's trying to find a better, more engaging way of bringing magazines into people's lives.

Penny Martin is editor-in-chief of The Gentlewoman, the magazine celebrating, "modern women of style and purpose". In this conversation she speaks about her enthusiasm for creating 1995, a one-off magazine published to celebrate the 30th anniversary of designer shopping outlet Bicester Village. And she reflects on The Gentlewoman's own 15 years in print, and what it takes to keep the magazine on top after a decade and a half.

Hear five independent magazines live on stage at the Queen of Hoxton in London. Featuring stories, essays and poetry read by The Fence, Real Review, Vittles, Offal and The Paper.

Tommy Sissons is the editor of Grass, the magazine of working-class arts and literature that launched in 2020 and recently reached the milestone of its fifth issue. In this conversation he speaks about the definition of what the working class is these days; his belief that class isn't talked about enough; and his mission to showcase the next generation of writers and artists.

Founder and editor Anja Charbonneau explains why she decided to stop publishing Broccoli magazine, and how that has enabled her to either launch or develop an exciting new slate of print titles

Editor Anano Shalamberidze speaks about Vision Undressed, a new magazine that’s dedicated to providing a platform for Georgia’s often underappreciated fashion talent.

Clem MacLeod, Caitlin McLoughlin, and P Eldridge are the editors behind Worms, the magazine that’s dedicated to exploring the underground and surfacing the best writing, bringing it up, “to the literary topsoil”. In this conversation they talk about the recent changes they have made to the magazine, allowing them to keep on publishing the best work, while avoiding the pitfalls of binaries and simple definitions.

Emily Makere Broadmore is editor-in-chief of Folly journal, which she describes as a literary journal for people who don’t buy literary journals. Online, the magazine calls itself, "The rebel child of the literary New Zealand scene," and, "The love child of a literary journal and a Victorian gossip rag," and I hope you’ll enjoy hearing Emily's story of overcoming establishment criticism to create a fresh new literary voice for New Zealand.

Hear our panel from the Publishers Spring Meet, speaking about how to market a magazine

Vegetables and community in Rebel Roots by Stack Magazines

Obsession and All Things Measured magazine by Stack Magazines

Josh Jones is a serial magazine maker who has been editing and publishing for more than 20 years, making everything from small zine projects, to international arts and culture titles, to customer publications for big brands. He’s a genuine font of knowledge and now he has published his own self-help book for anyone who wants to make their own magazine. I sat down with him to hear why making a magazine is not actually that hard, and why he advises people to just get started.

Ellen Freeman is the editor of Mildew, the secondhand fashion magazine that's based in Mexico, and which reflects on a whole world of vintage, recycled, and upcycled fashion and art. We delivered the second issue to Stack subscribers in November 2023, and the third issue came out at the end of last year, so I caught up with Ellen recently to find out what’s happened in a year’s worth of independent publishing, including the big change that has seen Mildew officially joining the Broccoli independent publishing empire.

The Lemming is an independent, anti-profit magazine that’s made with a strong DIY ethos, and an even stronger sense of social justice and political activism. In this episode, creative director Gabriel Carr, editor Beth Jones, and political editor Joseph Conway speak about their commitment to telling the truth, rather than telling two sides of a story.

For the first Stack podcast episode of 2025 I spoke with creative director Alex Stevenson and editor-in-chief Chloe Hayman about Soft Stir, the Australian magazine that provides a space for emerging artists and writers to experiment and find their voice.

The second instalment of our podcasts looking back at the magazines we delivered to Stack subscribers in 2024, featuring Serviette (Toronto), Nobody (Berlin), The Fence (London), Get Familiar (Amsterdam) and Pleasant Place (Amsterdam).

We're taking stock of the magazines we delivered to subscribers in 2024. Hear from the editors, designers, and publishers who made Dirty Furniture, Desired Landscapes, Offal, Crude Futures, and A Shade Colder, the magazines we sent out from January to May this year.

Peter Kormanyos is a strategist for TBWA advertising agency in Amsterdam, and he has also published a strange and intriguing new magazine called Purgatory Sandwich. The launch edition is split into two separate issues, which are presented together in a brown paper sandwich bag, promising what it calls, “Experimental fuckaroundery for lunchbreaks”. It's gleefully weird and chaotic, and in this episode he speaks about the ideas behind his creative project.

Les Jones, Molly Campbell and Wilf Jones are the team behind Contemporary Collage Magazine, and they're also father, daughter and son. The magazine started as an online publication, but when readers said they wanted to read in print the team also added a real ink and paper version, and in this episode they speak about how they're running it as a financially sustainable family business.

Rob Orchard is one of the founders and editors of Delayed Gratification magazine, and one of the authors of Misc., a new book they published earlier this month. If you’re a long-time listener to our podcast you might remember that I spoke to Rob three years ago, when the first Delayed Gratification book was published, and as you’ll hear, Misc. has been shaped in large part by that experience. This new book is smaller, cheaper, and more deliberately created for people buying Christmas gifts, but none of that changes the fact that the book market is incredibly competitive and a really tough place to make money. Or as he puts it, “When you publish a book, you buy a ticket in a lottery”.

Magculture Live is coming up fast (Thursday 7th November, at the Vitsoe shop here in London) so I took the opportunity to sit down with Magculture founder Jeremy Leslie and have a long chat about magazine stuff. We spoke about some of the high-profile magazines, like Vice and The Onion, which have recently returned to print. We spoke about changes in magazine design trends, and the forces that can influence those decisions. And there was a lot of love for Richard Turley and his many print projects.

Nicolas Kemper is publisher of New York Review of Architecture, the big, two-colour, newsprint magazine that has become renowned for its long, critical, entertaining essays about architecture and the city. He gave the first talk of the weekend at this year’s Indiecon and I loved his enthusiasm for all parts of publishing – not just the fun stuff like writing, editing, and throwing parties, but also what he calls, “building pipes”; making sure that things like their subscription management and contributor invoicing systems run as efficiently as possible. We're playing his Indiecon talk for this episode of the Stack podcast, so you can hear the story of how he and the team are building through their versions of the magazine.

Viêt and Jeremy Raider-Hoàng are the founders, editors and creative directors of No One, a new magazine that explores the queer nightlife of a different city each issue. It feels natural to marry the subjects of nightlife and queer culture, and you can tell there are big, serious ideas behind their impulse to document the hedonistic fun they see around them.

For this first episode of the new season I’ve got a conversation with Kat, the woman who makes Moan, a magazine of sensuality and eroticism that prioritises the female gaze. It has a lot of explicit imagery, but it’s definitely not pornographic, and in fact there’s something about the risograph print and production that makes it feel like more of an art book than anything else. Hear what she has learned from publishing the magazine for the last five years, and how she's planning on taking it to the next level.

Ellie Jackson is the editor-in-chief and creative director of The Movement Movement, the women’s sports magazine that is committed to broadening our understanding of what sports coverage should look like. Issue one came out a few weeks ago, but that was preceded by issue zero, which came out in 2022, and in this episode she speaks about the delay between the two issues, and the struggle to stay on track when life gets in the way.

Steph Chung is managing partner at Racquet, the New York-based magazine that takes a fresh, anti-elitist look at the world of tennis. There have been some big changes since the last issue, with editor David Shaftel and art director Larry Buchanan both leaving the magazine, and a more commercial emphasis across the pages, with a big Gucci photo shoot on the cover and inside, and a partnership with Seoul-based cultural creators Ssoldot. It’s all part of a plan to take advantage of what Steph calls, “the convening power of the magazine”, and in this conversation she outlines their plan for making it more commercially successful, while expanding further into events, merchandise, and other activities based around tennis.

Zuzana Kvetková is executive editor of Backstage Talks, the magazine that grew out of Bratislava’s By Design Conference. Their new issue will be landing in shops very soon, and as she explains in this podcast, it marks something of a watershed. Because after 10 years they’ve decided that it’s time to stop running the conference, which in turn prompts lots of questions about what the magazine should be.