Cereal magazine is all for ‘Travel & Lifestyle’, this magazine gets published twice a year and is devised into city-specific chapters. With each chapter, it comprises different features on places, people and products, also this magazines is showcased with beautifully visually striking photography. An interlude section is also included in every volume, this features a selection of style, and culture articles.
Cereal magazine also offers a range of city guides, they provide the reader with a tightly edited selection of their favourite places in a variety of different cities around the world. Each of these guides is published online, and come with an introduction to the city, as-well as alongside essential information, and also features anywhere from 10-20 different locations. This city guide also comes with exclusive photography which is taken by their team, and has been laid out in an editorial style. They also produce printed guide books for select cities.
The select Cities for these guide books, are as follow:
Austin, Charlestown, Helsinki, Los Angeles, Seoul, Bath, Copenhagen, Hong Kong, New York, Singapore, Bristol, Edinburgh, London, Paris, Vancouver.
I purchased this magazine on the 02 May, after waiting a week to buy it. I couldn't find this magazine in other WHSmith shop, apart from the one I work in, on weekends. I first noticed this magazine however, on a shift as I was routing through design magazines to help with my work.
As I was looking I noticed the title ‘ C | E | R | E | A | L’, I quite liked the way that this was laid out and thought I would give it a quick scan through. On the front cover, it is very minimal and basic, something I think what you’d expect from a Travel and Lifestyle magazine. Underneath the title, is clearly states that this is from the travel and lifestyle genre of magazines. Also, is states that this is VOL 8, which clearly says that there is eight volumes within this type of series.
Underneath is a beautifully clear image of a snow capped-mountain. I think that this photograph is just stunning, I love the way it looks on the paper stock magazine, I love the texture of it when it is placed in your hands. I love that this magazine feels like it’s been made with care and affection towards the readers of this style of genre, or to it’s growing captive audience. The binding on this magazine is also quite minimal and basic stating the title of the magazine, and 08 / stating their volume number of this specific magazine.
Within its inner pages, they have some promotional work for RIMOWA, here this is showcasing their type of work and this is a luggage company. Then after this page, the title is:
C | E | R | E | A | L and there is a couple of paragraphs from the editor: Rose Park.
The opposite spread of that page is another ad for a clothing company called TOAST. On the next page is where they say who was involved on creating the magazine from editors, creative directors, contributing and sub editor, advertising manager, illustrator, and also the sales manager. It also states where the company is based: Bristol. It also states their varies social media platforms that they are specialised to, this being FaceBook, Twitter and Instagram.
Their contents page is rather minimal, and also very clean. I like the way that it looks, it just looks simple, but not too simple. The contents page is also rather different to any other contents page that I have seen in a magazine, it starts by:
- Yukon
012. Kluane (National Park and Reserve)
028. Master Carver (First Nations Wood Work)
032. Yukon Wildlife (Portraits of a population)
038. Dempster Highway (The road to the arctic circle)
I like this sort of contents page, as they're just under one sub-heading and it doesn't make it confusing. It simply states that these things are under the whole of Yukon as a whole. Then they also have a section for an Interlude. Then after this short Interlude pages, we go back to things about Yukon.
050. Curated (Candles for the winter months)
056. Stahl House (Case study home)
066. Esk Cashmere (Luxury knitwear from Scotland)
076. Tuscan Sun (A Photo Essay)
I will be looking through two of these pages from the sub-heading of Yukon. Here, I am going to analyse Yukon Wildlife, and also Esk Cashmere.
/ Yukon Wildlife, on these pages there is a vast amount of beautiful illustration. It states who wrote up this piece and who was the illustrator and here we have:
Words – Richard Aslan, Illustration – Lorna Picton. I have read the first, opening paragraph a few times to really get to grips with the overlook of the wildlife found in a place like Yukon, and my favourite sentence is: ‘… The wildlife in Yukon is varied, abundant, playing out the trials and dramas of daily life far from our watchful eyes. Under this opening paragraph however, there is an illustration of a Moose, the typical animal we expect to see over in such a mountainous place. Then it is like a fact sheet / card, they give little facts about Moose's.
They state its call, and its height which is 2 metres. Its weight which is 500 kg, and their life-span is 10-20 years. Habitat – Forest, Rivers, Lakes and also the wetlands. It explains what their diet is like, ie: Shrubs, leaves and aquatic plants. It says when the best time to seek out a Moose is: around lakes in the spring and summer time, and that their widespread during Autumn.
Then on the opposite page is their illustration of a moose. On the next couple of spreads within this section they talk of more animals these are: Grizzly Bear and the Caribou.
/ The other page I will be looking at is one with a little more written work, this is the Esk Cashmere page.
On this spread, the words were written by – Lucy Brook and the photographs were taken by – Rich Stapleton. This first spread is where it states what sub-heading this is and who has written the work and taken the photos. I like style of work as it indicates to the reader that someone else has done work prior to the previous page. I also like the background colour which this particular spread is on, it’s on a very light grey which looks beautiful in my opinion. The next page, is where you see the multiple paragraphs for this particular setting, all about knitwear. The opposite page has around four images. These are beautiful and really stand out, they're a variety of a foggy road which I presume Scotland. Some towers of thread, a beautiful black and grey jumper, and also a lone sheep in the fog.
The next spread also uses a double page for photographs, the one on the left, is in middle but has been cropped rather small so the white of the page is still visible, this particular photo is of a sewing machine stitching into a new jumper. The one on the right takes up that entire page and is of a grey-blue sky. The same goes for the next two pages, the one on the left takes up the entire page and this is a telephone pole with the electric wires. The opposite is of a jumper with the white page as a border.
Overall, I clearly think this magazine is beautiful. I love the layouts, I love the photographs. I think it is truly a stunning magazine. The cover is what drove me to this magazine and it serves its purpose for Travel and Lifestyle magazines. I also love the back cover, the back indicates what is in this volume, Yukon, Tuscany, Stahl House, Hong Kong and St. Ives.
I also really like that the barcode is on the back of the magazine rather than the front. I like that because it doesn’t spoil the way the front cover looks. I believe that, that is something I will be inspired by for my own magazine, depending on what style of cover I choose.
/ I also asked my boyfriend what he particularly likes about this magazine and this is his detailed opinion:
He likes that the back of the magazine has the places which each volume includes of, he also said that he likes that this is the main focus of the back of the magazine. The material for the magazine is paper stock, which he knows is more expensive to reproduce and for £10 seems a bit steep, also the fact that this magazine is in white also is a negative. He doesn’t like that it could catch fingerprints and dirt onto the white magazine. However, he likes how the back of the magazine with the barcode and places involved, along with the website are centred in the middle. He states that it is nice that it is shaped and build like a book, instead of that of a magazine. He also agreed with me, that the front is very simple and minimalist and he also likes the spine / binding of the magazine. However, he doesn’t like the entire front cover, he likes the photograph he just thinks that he wishes it would blend in to the white border of the magazine.
No comments:
Post a Comment