issue 1. i hate being part of the generation we are in, so dull and boring and reliant on technology, everythings been done before time and time again. being different isnt being different its just being the same as all the other ‘different people’ that wear the same ‘different things’ that theyve seen another ‘different’ kind of person wearing on instagram/. i guess thats what this zine is about ?????? personazine explores millenial design, fashion and culture. it is designed/written for our audience by our audience and focuses on taking advantage of the use of technology as well as exploring the negativity surrounding it. we promise to be tacky yet beautiful and informative yet somewhat pointless. its all for the aesthetic darling ;)
Editor-in-chief Imogen Wilson Special thanks to Claire Marsh, Elizabeth Adams, Diana Ferriera, Pawel Pryztocki, Ruby Brown, Opal, Nadia Lee Cohen, Karo Rutowska, Nicole Ngai.
1-2 Instagram Vs. Reality 3-8 Gossipgirls 11-12 Social media and the demise of our self love 13-14 How to be Insta-popular 15-20Eve by Karo 21-22Opal 23-26Chat up tragedies 27-30 Which Londoner are you? 31-32 A brief interview with Nadia Lee Cohen 33-37Elaine by Nicole
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Instagram vs. reality In this day and age, its hard to differentiate the real from the fake. Growing up as part of a generation that is so reliant on the internet and use of social media, it is easy to fall naive to the trap of the online world and compare our lives with those that we follow. This is something we all do, or have done at some point. Scrolling through our Instagram feed on a Friday night, lay in bed with a shitty Ristorante oven pizza for dinner to see beautiful made up girls in expensive outfits pre drinking ready for a big night out. We sit wondering what happened and how and when we became so boring? The reality is, theres probably 15 other girls looking and thinking the exact same thing, questioning themselves and feeling like failures of 20 year old girls. When did looking fun on Instagram and Snapchat begin to be the decider on whether or not we are actually fun people? Millennials are so engulfed with social media, just looking at other peoples content, social lives and belongings makes us hate our own lives and envy those of others. I am one of those girls, the girls that will sit for hours and hours on end procrastinating, stalking the perfect girls with all the money and the perfect relationships and amazing clothes, Only to then question what I do and why my relationship isn’t like that and why I can’t have all of those clothes? Instagram is NOT reality..(most of the time). I do it myself, only post the best photographs that make me look like I’m always out having fun and buying new clothes. When the reality is, that gorgeous pair
of trousers are probably the first thing that I’ve bought myself in months and ill probably wear them every day for the next 2 weeks? Our belongings and follower count isn’t a measure of our personalities, it shouldn’t be what defines us as ‘cool’ or ‘fun’ as that just adds to the constant pressure of trying to act up to be all of those things and more. We look up to these people, these fake online personas that probably don’t even exist and these girls that look super fun but may well be super reserved in person and nothing like their Instagram accounts. That’s another thing, online confidence. There has been so many times that I have met the people I secretly obsess over online, some of which are locally famous or even those with the 20K+ follower count. 9 times out of 10 they are NOTHING like they make out online, instead, a more shy and quiet version of that they portray. It makes me think, behind that screen they are just the same and probably do the exact same insta-envy-stalking that I do most nights. We will always want what we don’t have and want to be what we are not and I guess that is kind of just reality, but I can’t help but think it would be a thousand times different if the Internet and social media weren’t a thing. Maybe then, we would have stronger people skills and more confident in ourselves and with speaking to others (in real life). Maybe then we would be happy being who we truly are and not a fake version of what we think people want us to be and what will get us the most likes and followers.
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Photographed by Pawel Pryztocki Styled by Claire Marsh, Dianna Ferriera and Elizabeth Adams Art direction by Imogen Wilson
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Social media,
the phenomenon of the twenty first century has left so many of us glued to our phones trying to figure out what exactly she must be doing to make her waist so much smaller than her hips. And how could someone’s life possibly beso perfect with so much money ? Here I am, nineteen wondering exactly where it went wrong for me whilst wondering which selfie makes me hair look the thickest, and NOT like it hasn’t been bleached to fuck. The fact of the matter is. Whilst our social media can seem like the biggest key into the world of our peers the content is entirely restricted to what decide to share with the world. No matter what, we construct our lives to ray the ‘perfect’ versions of us. Few of us would upload a makeup less photo. But why? is it the fear of not getting enough attention or is it the fact we have been conditioned by social media to hate our true selves but envy everyone else that we believe has ‘more’ than us. More beauty, more
money, more everything. We challenge this hatred by exaggerating our own lives. We only put ourselves out there when we have new clothes or the day our make up looks best and of course, only if the top we are wearing makes us look skinnier than we are. At this point the question of self love really came to me. We can tell ourselves we love who we our in every caption and every empowering tweet but is the reality that we just want others to love us. Because really who else are we posting for. It’s difficult to see how we post for ourselves on platforms that encourage human interaction. We monitor our likes. And, if after ten minutes we aren’t on double figures we have failed and we are ugly. Right? WRONG. For the sake of all us young girls we must stop conditioning our minds to the idea that receiving approval for physical and materialist things is the only measure of our own worth. If we do not do this we risk complete and utter self
hatred among young girls. A study has shown that the number of girls under seventeen being admitted to hospital due to self harm has risen by 68% in the last decade and I can’t help but feel there is a significant correlation between this and the rise of social media. The new age of technology is pushing us to illness, the more we seem to appreciate others the less we appreciate ourselves. We have to stop tying to prove ourselves online as if that’s the only way we can express who we are. Social media has offered us an amazing platform to promote our work whether that be art, writing, fashion. Yet, we are using it instead to abuse our own minds and put ourselves and others down. Peoples beauty should not mean the demise of our own. Instead, I propose we chose to celebrate ourselves and others. Chosen to understand that your own true unique identity is above anything else. We should all love ourselves,and not because others don’t.
HOW TO BE INSTA POPULAR We are living in a generation where our follower count means more to us than our IQ. We judge people based on their Instagram profiles and on how good the selfies they take are, how social they appear to be on social media and how many likes their posts get. This got me wondering, what the fuck is it that makes some people so
‘insta-popular’ and why do we all want that for ourselves? I myself can admit that I am embarrassed and take it personally if I don’t get at least 100 likes on a selfie and I would HATE not to at least have 1K followers. This got me thinking like why do I want this for myself? Why am I so hard on myself when it comes to my social media presence
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and what is it that I want to look yourself, the person you like online. I believe I certainly wish you were. Then we realise come across differently to how that this ‘fake’ version of us gets I am online, for some reason more likes, more attention and it I have a lot more confidence makes you question what you’re behind a screen than face to doing wrong off instagram. face, which I kind of see as a Answering ‘how to be instagram good thing as I popular’ is can be what sarcastic I want to be in every and do things sense, as in I want to do all honesty, I but wouldn’t have no idea necessarily what it even have the means to be confidence to instagram do in real life. popular. For For example, years I have theres so many strived to be clothes/ outfits cool online, I will post photos gain followers in on instagram and likes and but would never overall, look set foot out the cool. I have house in them. realised I will Instagram never have the time nor the is a platform where you can effort to put my all into my social create a totally new media accounts. I will never be identity for yourself, be an influencer like Mika Francis the airbrushed, dressed and I should never alter myself to appear differently online. up, popular version of 16
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We’ve all experienced the tragedy of creepy guys casually chatting us up via social media and every time we see that little dm notification, deep down inside we hope it’s someone atleast a lil bit hot? Usually, just to be let down by dirty inuendos and cheesy chat up lines, modern day romance isnt really romantic at all, is it? We called out for the weirdest, creepiest yet funniest messages our followers had ever recieved and have included a few of our faves for you to cringe over! Who said romance was dead?????
which londoner are you You’re out drinking with your mates, what do you order from the bar? A. A bottle of prosecco, of course! B. A can of lager, Red stripe / Stella, whatever. C. A girly cocktail, preferably in a fancy glass like one of those jam jars or
something. D. An ale You’re getting your first tattoo, what is it? A. I’d never get a tattoo. Would you put a bumper sticker on a Bentley? B. A stick and poke off one of my drunken mates at an after party.
C. Something off pinterest, maybe a mandala or a latin quote. D. A traditional piece, maybe a rose or a dagger or a ship?
What’s your ideal night out? A. Hitting a club in Mayfair with my girls in a gorgeous LBD and killer heels. B. Pre-drinks at a mates, play some pool in a pub and get pissed off flat lager before heading back to the same mates place for a drug fueled after party. C. 2 for 1 cocktails before hitting tiger tiger in my new pretty little thing dress. D. Underworld.
Pick a genre of music. A. RnB B. Dubstep C. All the stuff in the charts. D. Metal Where in London do you live? A. West B. South C. Clapham :) D. North How do you get to work? A. Addison Lee B. Overground or on my road bike. C. Mainly by Uber, I hate getting on the sweaty tube at rush hour! D. The tube or the bus, standard
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Pick one place to pick up dinner:
B. Creative director or something fuck knowswhat that even is A. The Ivy but sounds decent B. Morleys C. Something in PR C. McDonalds even though D. Lead in a band :p I’m supposed to be on a diet. What’s your favourite D. Wetherspoons social media platform? Your flats on fire and you A. Twitter to moan only have time to pick one about how hard it is to item, which will it be? be me B. Instagram so I can post my 35mm A. My chihuahua photographs B. Either my 50g of Amber C. Snapchat for nights leaf of my 35mm point out with the girls :P and shoot . D. Facebook to keep C. My velvet teddy lip stick in contact with my or Anastasia dip brow friends pomade! D. My guitar Whats your dream job? A. People like me should’nt have to work
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Your name is probably something like Lizzie or Millie and you probably live in Chelsea somewhere in a nice big fancy house and attend dinner parties with friends on an evening. I’m sure your wardrobe contents equals more than the amount I pay yearly for rent and bills and your dad probably drives a fancy car.
Let me guess, you study at UAL and live in Peckham but are originally from somewhere like Buckinghamshire or maybe Kent? You drink magnum and smoke hash and smash Xanax on a Wednesday at Canavans Karaoke. You probably rinse depop and are member of every Wavey Garms-esque facebook group.
You’re what they call a ‘girly girl’, you probably live for high street shopping, ‘reality television’ and celeb magazines like Heat and Ok. I bet your resteraunt of choice for a ‘treat’ is Nandos and you’ll ALWAYS make sure to take a picture for Instagram/ Snapchat AND check in on Facebook. + You probs live in Clapham.
I bet you live somewhere near Camden, but not quite Camden because your part-time job in a tourist vape shop wont pay rent that high. You spend your weekends in The World’s End / Underworld with you’re mates from some Uni music society and ‘jamming’ in your North London basement.
We got in contact with mega-babe creative Nadia Lee Cohen to ask a few questions about her work, unfortunately as she was busy she said she could only answer 3 very basic questions. So here’s our interview with the famous Nadia -
But atleast we got to feature her name in the zine I guess lol.