Papillon is one of the newest kids fashion online mags originating from New York and today I have a story featuring cool teen fashion shot by Yvette Velasquez and with creative direction by Michel Onofrio the magazine’s co-founders.
There has been an explosion in online kids publishing with many art directors and photographers starting their own titles. Mainly these serve as an alternative portfolio’s and serve to feed Instagram accounts for all the contributors involved. Papillon also has a print edition which can be ordered online but not all the new titles do produce in print as well.
The magazine business itself is in the midst of change that even Conde Nast seems to be having trouble navigating with advertising migrating to Influencers or online and the companies pivoting away from giving resources to print and instead towards experiences such as the Vogue festival with talks and meet and greet opportunities with the magazine editors.
Most editorial is submitted now for minimal or no fee and as such it makes perfect sense for contributors to begin their own publications, after all, why give your hard work for free to someone else! Even well known brands I am now told want to pay minimal fees for creative work.
Navigating all this is hard for creatives especially those like me who grew up in the old system and it remains to be seen what can be sustainable for the future or if the photographers, stylists and hair and make up artists will give up on this new system and seek other work that actually pays.