Zweigart's new magazine

I just spoke with Jim Kornecki at Zweigart this morning about the new magazine.

They will be sending out information on it to shops and stitchers in the coming weeks, but meanwhile here are a few more pieces of information.

There will be cross stitch in the magazine, but they are open to all kinds of needlework. This includes hardanger, needlepoint, punched work, knitting, crochet...you name it.

A lot will be driven by feedback on the designs and contents of the magazine from the public. What you ask for is what they'll try to deliver.

I asked specifically if they were going to be going for the whole spread of beginner, intermediate, and experienced stitcher with a range of designs. The answer was a resounding YES!

Jim said that feedback he has gotten from shops and stitchers was the lack of a wide range of types of needlework and designs aimed at something other than beginners. After hearing this repeatedly, that's what he's going to try for in this new publication.

And he didn't know what rctn was, so he hasn't been reading it here. lol

Bottom line, more information is coming. What this magazine ends up being depends on the responses from you, the stitcher.

Nyssa, who has already submitted a few designs this afternoon At River's End

Now this sounds more interesting and has definitely gotten my attention! I'll be looking here for any more information about it. I'm crossing my fingers this will be something polished and varied.

Dianne

Nyssa wrote:

Neither of know the business climate in Australia; there may be no other "stitching" magazines, the owner is a driven stitcher and is willing sacrifice profit for quality or pays the authors in subscriptions or stash, the population of stitcher per 1000 could be higher there.

I just wish I could get my hands on it more often. C

Cool stuff if you like mud ;)

As I understand it from the publishing connected friend, a niche magazine targets a subset of people below a certain threshold of the general population. Since she worked on "Working Mother" (10 years ago), I'll use it

- it targeted all paid working mothers, line workers to professionals in a one size fits all magazine. And it ignored (then, haven't picked an issue up in ages) those women who were middle to upper management, in technical areas or were in the professions (law, medicine). While the need for a magazine addresses the issues of those women existed, the population just wasn't big enough to support many articles on those, rather unique areas.

There are also specialty magazines and newsletters, not quite vanity presses but catering to the those "groups" that will fork over the dollars to buy a glossy magazine concerning a limited subject.

So contact them and submit the idea

I know you're not, but that's how the publishers see it - a special interest appealing to small ( to them) subset of crafters. And the "needle crafts" are already divvied into quilting and knitting and machine embroidery and crochet and weaving and beading and cross stitch.... Ad nauseam

So why not again?

Ahhh, but there are . . . and well rounded, including cross stitch, silk ribbon, wool embroidery . . . endless parade of lots of different stuff. It's called "Australian Embroidery & Cross Stitch." Lovely magazine. Not as slick as "Inspirations", but diverse with lovely designs.

I happen to know that "Inspirations" pays well for their articles. As well, "Aus. Emb & CS". I have a friend who has had her works published in both.

Australia is miles ahead of us in needlework. They don't favor openwork (drawn thread or pulled work). But lots and lots of "other" stuff.

Dianne

Ahhh, bite the bullet and subscribe ;-) It's the only craft magazine I subscribe to anymore. Their projects are just so delicious, and the directions are so very clear. I even put myself on automatic renewal so I wouldn't ever forget to renew. And actually, it's not as expensive to subscribe to as some other magazines. I forget which one I was looking into that seemed nice, but the delivered price was significantly more than Inspirations and I just couldn't see going there.

Best wishes, Ericka

Another good Italian mag is Ricamo Italiano (in it's second year of publication) they publish a lot of their patterns and instructions online:

(Better pics of the projects are of course seen in the magazine)However! Most Italian mags assume you are already savvy with the basics of embroidery which can be frustrating for the beginner. If you're determined however, you can succeed. I often took the mags to guild meetings and asked around if anyone had done this or that (showing pics) until someone could show me or point me to books.(Just so you know: There are some of us working on crossing the translation barrier but it's slow and difficult!) is working on how-to articles in english and we're also working on a "dictionary" of sorts so that you can find instructions in english once you know what the english terminology is for the different stitches.Another note: I wrote to Piecework recently noting the lack of Italian needlework articles and gave them lots of internet links and people that they could contact to write articles and get projects from but they have not answered so I don't know if I inspired them or not. :-) Dianne, if there's something you need translated, I'll help you if I can!

Jeanine in Canada

Dianne Lewandowski wrote:

I thank you for your offer and may take you up on it! There's a couple of patterns I'd like to sink my teeth into. One is a shadow work piece. Stefania helped me with a drawn thread piece.

I've been having serious health problems and eyesight problems and haven't embroidered since January. But I'll pick up on it again. Perhaps this summer.

Dianne

Dianne, if you had the urge, maybe you could contact Zweigart and offer your services with your excellent stitch graphics! You might even just want to contact them with some of your ideas...they just might jump at the chance to have someone so knowledgeable working with them!

Joan