The Last Magazine: exploding type and the demise of 90's indy mag culture.
Some time around 2004 I got to know David Renard, then owner of Net Circulation -- a boutique magazine distribution company in New York. I was in the process of conceptualizing my first print publication, PLASTIQUE MAGAZINE, David was in the process of writing his first book, THE LAST MAGAZINE. In the book, David theorized the demise of the indy mag culture that had boomed since the late nineties & even suggested we'd all be reading newspapers from sheets of electronic paper we kept folded in our bags. A lot has changed since then: that electronic paper never did take off, and indy mag culture certainly suffered.
The last thing I heard of David Renard? Well he was in the trenches of NYC's dog eat dog world of fin-tech-neo-nut-fuck starts ups, probably killing it I'm sure. Indy mag in the bag for the bathroom break.
This currently out of print @rizzolibooks publication documents hundreds of indy mags from that era, designed by veteran exploded-type designer @vince_frost
In the book, David Renard theorized the demise of the indy mag culture that had boomed since the late nineties & even suggested we'd all be reading newspapers from sheets of electronic paper we kept folded in our bags.
