“Reading is a big part of childhood, but the more sophisticated technology becomes, the more passive we are. I grew up surrounded by magazines because my dad was what I would call the ‘ultimate subscriber’. We had so many titles at home, and one of the things I found most exciting is how you can discover new subjects so easily. They act as windows into the things we are passionate about. Even now, when I feel stuck creatively, I go to a newsstand and flick through beautiful magazines. With Storytime, we wanted kids to have access to that possibility.
Lulu Mazzocco Skantze is the founder and creator of Storytime, a magazine that encourages children to read for pleasure. She believes paper is critical in creating and engaging with the next generation of readers.
With magazines, you can draw on them, roll them up, carry them everywhere with you – you can even tear a full page and stick to a wall if you love it.
I’ve been working in magazines most of my life, and about a decade ago, I had a sense that we were failing children. A lot of magazines for kids were quite flimsy, full of plastic toys. It was all about hooking them in with free gifts rather than content and the magazines didn’t feel special. I felt I had a mission as a publisher – if we're going to have a generation of future readers, we need to get the young ones loving magazines again. And for them to love magazines, we not only have to give them awesome content but also something beautiful to engage and create memories with.
Magazines are particularly appealing for kids because they sit in that sweet spot between being a book and a toy. With books you might have to be a bit more precious, while with magazines, you can draw on them, roll them up, carry them everywhere with you – you can even tear a full page and stick to a wall if you love it. How many kids make magazines out of magazines – cutting and pasting to create their own thing? There is something magical about playing and learning at the same time.
I think there is something wonderfully quiet about paper.
I wanted to create something that offered that sort of playful stimulus. Storytime is highly interactive, every story has extras to encourage engaging with them, there are puzzles and games and paper playtime as well.
We had to think about the type of paper we needed for that level of interactivity. Initially, we chose matte paper with a bit of texture but after six months we realised how important colour is in childhood. We have a lot of colourful illustrations and in the first few editions, the colours were too subdued so we switched to a silkier paper that could show off the vibrance of the artwork better. We also wanted it to be durable because we imagined kids going back to the issues time and time again, not just reading it and throwing it out. There are eight levels of stories, so as they get better at reading, they can go back to an issue and delve into the harder-to-read stories. To encourage interactivity, the paper is uncoated. We wanted kids to be able to write, draw and play with it, and definitely not to tear it. We had to make the magazine feel special because we weren’t relying on free gifts to get kids to buy it. That meant having high quality paper and being perfect bound.
We live in a world that's constantly buzzing, and I think there is something wonderfully quiet about paper. While digital keeps us on edge, print lets us breathe. It engages four of our senses and that’s very powerful. Just the sound and feel of turning the pages can be calming. I think we are only now starting to understand the value that it provides.
While digital keeps us on edge, print lets us breathe.
Back when we started Storytime in 2014, we had to convince people there was a need for a high-quality print magazine for kids. At the time, there were a group of charities working with the government on a literacy campaign for children. The aim was to increase reading for fun, which would then help increase literacy levels by 2025. We knew we wanted to be part of increasing children’s literacy and reading for pleasure, and we strongly believed that paper was the right medium for that.
A lot of data shows that when you read things on paper, there’s a 25 percent better retention rate than when you read things digitally.
A decade ago, nobody was talking about attention spans or concentration, but now that conversation is everywhere. A lot of data shows that when you read things on paper, there’s a 25 percent better retention rate than when you read things digitally. And part of that is due to the sensorial experience of holding a physical object in your hand, which means you can map the information better as it sits on the page, as opposed to when it is constantly moving on a screen. Even our title Storytime comes from that idea: sitting together, reading together and creating memories around stories.
Life is good when you have a pile of magazines to dive in right next to you. Kids need the same opportunity to dive in and discover.
I actually have high hopes for the next generation of readers. I think, in a way, because they have grown up with digital, they will be better at knowing when to unplug and when to escape the noise. They will be able to say: I don’t want to be on my phone right now. As publishers it is our responsibility to make sure that there are excellent options out there: exciting things to read and beautiful things to look at. Life is good when you have a pile of magazines to dive in right next to you, and kids need the same opportunity to dive in and discover.
As told for Daniela Walker
Photos by Jussi Puikkonen
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