I first heard about
FORMzine from a newspaper clipping about a college student who takes street style images in the liberal Birkenstock and bicycle town I spent my college days in. Tweeting with them led to a quick tea time meet-up last week with editor Winnie and co-founder Sarah of
FORMzine.
What I realized in conversation is that they are simply providing information and content in a very generation specific way. It's a zine with lifestyle content and coverage just as any print magazine, but they do it in the most refreshingly modern way.
It's a publication that was birthed out of a University environment, but their ability to look beyond the confines of the school to build sartorial bridges to the arts scene in Detroit, as well as personally covering fashion shows and events internationally holds and interesting juxtaposition. Their scope is huge, but comfortably local at the same time.
What excites me most about what they are doing is the fact that they are a full publication team that functions like an independent blogger would. Existing at the shows and events, tweeting and sharing images as they happen, sharing content in real time- these are things that you can typically only expect from very on-it bloggers. But
FORMzine gets it, and they take their readers for a unique ride.
We spoke about the Midwest as a space in the lifestyle industry that gets a bad rap most times, but what's most interesting about what they are building is that they want to make sure that however far away FORMzine goes or reaches, just as Google once did, they want to make sure it always has a space and presence in the place that built them. Right in Michigan.
Check out
FORMzine and
tweet them to let them know what you think!
