8 independent sports magazines reaching new audiences
Sports has changed a lot in the last few years. While mainstream publications have been slow to adjust to the new audiences and areas of interest, indie mags saw their opportunity, picked up the ball and ran with it.
From the introduction of skateboarding and breakdancing at the Olympics, to the unstoppable rise in popularity of women’s football, and the appearance of sports stars in films, perfume ads and fashion shoots, sport has spread far beyond the tracks and pitches and there’s almost no part of culture it hasn’t touched.
As Jeremy Leslie of magCulture told us, “Sport has become ever more glamorous in recent years. Art and fashion have long crossed over, and now sport seems next in line to join them.”
The zines, journals and magazines responding to this change are as diverse and varied as the new landscape of sport is, driven by a move away from traditional scores and stats coverage, and a desire to seek out and serve more niche audiences. Photojournalism, fashion shoots and limited edition artwork are all features of this new wave of publications.
We reviewed 8 indie mags that are finding new styles, formats and audiences for sport.
You can click the links below to jump to each magazine.
- OPEN Tennis
- SEASON: a fashion & football zine
- CircleZeroEight: a sports culture zine
- The High Route: a ski journal
- Players: a fashion magazine focused on sports stars
- Amateurs: an outdoor magazine
- Summit Journal: a climbing magazine
- Esses: a motorsport magazine
OPEN Tennis: an oversize indie mag for tennis culture
With the mission of “creating a new storyline” for the sport, OPEN Tennis is a magazine that wants to change how tennis is seen.
It’s not printed by Park|Graphius but we love the oversize large format print with artful cover photography on the cover that looks more like an art or photography magazine. That aesthetic is continued inside with a heavy dose of graphic design, paintings and photography illustrating articles on everything from fashion and art to business and psychology, all given a distinctive tennis (top) spin.
Variety is a big part of the OPEN Tennis’ aesthetic. Inside, an article about how Ralph Lauren revolutionised Wimbledon features full page fashion photography, while another on AI-written tennis biographies is illustrated with psychedelic graphic art.
That extends to the materials of the magazine too. Recent issues have included multiple and limited edition covers, different paper stocks, and even different styles of binding.
SEASON: a sustainably printed football zine
Football has changed in the last few decades. Gone are the days of pies and pints on the terraces. Replacing it are footballers with their own fragrances, the huge rise of women’s football, and SEASON.
Styled as a “creative football and fashion zine that’s free to prioritise women and marginalised communities…”, SEASON covers fashion, as well food, culture and politics.
Inside it jumps from an article on the impact of football boots on women’s sneaker culture to discussions of gender and class in the game. The pages are dense walls of colourful text and images layered on images. Each turn of the page engages you visually in a new way.
Park’s use of FSC paper, 100% offshore wind electricity to power production, and recycling of 95% of print chemicals for reuse made them a great fit for SEASON, as a magazine that exhorts the beautiful game to do better.
The text and zine-style artwork are tightly packed on Revive Offset, the glossy fashion photography pops on Magno Gloss stock. One part culture magazine, one part fashion glossy, SEASON is truly a mag of two halves.
CircleZeroEight: a photography magazine for sports culture
CircleZeroEight styles itself as a magazine celebrating “how sport enhances social and cultural life”.
It was created by former GQ Style fashion director Elgar Johnson-Forster, and unmistakably has fashion magazine in its DNA.
Articles are illustrated with moody fashion photography and space is given to covering the designers who are shaping sports fashions as well as the athletes who are wearing it.
Their editorials channel the punchy clothing-as-art style of a fashion mag. A review of an ASICS trainer talks about “a silhouette that first turned heads in 2015”, while another for Adidas Superstars describes them as a shoes that “doesn’t need to explain itself”.
It’s not printed by Park|Graphius but the materials do a great job of enhancing the fashionmag feel too. The text pages are printed on glossy stock, which serves to enhance an uncomplicated photographic style that tends to focus on bodies in motion or artistic framings of clothing and equipment.
The High Route: a ski journal with a matt laminate cover
If you flicked through The High Route without paying too much attention, your impression might be that this is a publication that is very serious about skiing.
There are detailed maps, wide angled photographs of intrepid skiers scaling mountains, and article titles like “Growth and Inspiration”, “North Pacific Snow Study” and “Applied Science”.
It’s laid out in two columns on white Edixion Offset stock, giving it a high end, matt feel. It’s printed in a more square quarto format.
And you’d be right, The High Route is a serious journal for the sport, but it’s also having a lot of fun.
There are poems and human interest stories. The many facets of snow are shown in the vivid photography, and deconstructed in a tongue-in-cheek essay on the science of water.
On the last page of the magazine, there’s the kind of word game. By that point The High Route has covered every aspect of skiing, from the sublime to the silly, and that’s the kind of fun you can only have when you’re taking it seriously.
Players: a fashion magazine focusing on sports stars
From the creative minds behind CR Fashion Book, Players takes the idea of sports stars as fashion icons and runs with it.
With sports stars increasingly controlling their image through social media, rather than via an agent or publicist, the idea of a media platform which allows them to express their identity through fashion makes perfect sense.
The magazine pairs up featured sports stars with fashion photographers and stylists, alongside photojournalism and editorial with a surprisingly broad focus. Covering topics from the history of sporting fashion icons to what makes a great mascot, the editorial and photography explore every place where fashion and sport intersect.
Players isn’t printed by Park|Graphius. Visually, it takes cues from high end fashion magazines. It’s a large format glossy magazine, with heavy paper stock that contributes to a collectible quality about the product. Issues are released twice a year, with a dozen limited edition cover variations.
Amateurs: an outdoor magazine with 3 cover versions
Describing itself as “a symptom of time spent outdoors, usually presenting as a magazine”, Amateurs is an oversize print celebration of adventures in nature.
As soon as you pick a copy up, you realise how serious the makers are about that. The cover is printed on Soperset Offset stock with a sandgrain laminate with a texture that evokes a rough, off-road trail. It also makes the magazine more durable because they want you to take it with you, wherever you’re going.
Full page photography of mountains and hiking routes, printed on tactile Munken Lynx Rough stock, sit alongside glossy art photography of tent-based exhibitions and fashion shoots on Essential Gloss.
The articles cover the destinations, art and culture of outdoor sports, all presented with a bold, typographic style that feels pleasingly timeless.
Somewhere between the visuals that pull you into the page and tactile experience of handling the magazine, Amateurs is a publication that’s engrossing to all of your senses.
Summit Journal: a legendary ski magazine relaunched
The Summit name has a long history in indie publishing. Originally launched as Summit in 1955, it ran for over 40 years before going into hibernation, to then reemerge as Summit Journal in 2023.
The new incarnation picks up where the old left off, a fiercely independent magazine dedicated to climbing and only climbing. It has no sponsored content, no reviews, and no adverts. Instead the focus is on great photography and long-form editorial.
Articles on peoples’ hard-wired need to climb and full page photography of the mountainscapes of Yosemite shore up the idea of climbing as adventure and exploration, more than a mere hobby.
As an object, Summit Journal lives up to its rebranding as a journal. Its large dimensions and heavy, matt paper stock combine with the epic quality of the photography to make it feel more like a coffee table book.
Esses: magazine printing for a motorsport publisher
Esses is a motorsport magazine with a difference. How many other magazines aimed at racing fans have a cover story about golf, or articles on needlepoint and anime?
“We knew we wanted to be the publication covering the sport, sure, but also to be the guide to the culture, the food, the fashion, the travel, and the eccentrics of the grand prix world.” (p. 4)
That holistic approach leaves the magazine feeling more like a high end lifestyle mag, albeit with an undeniable background thrum of motor racing. The effect is aided by the arresting art photography on every page and luxurious matt Munken Lynx Smooth Natural White stock.
When you get to the cover interview with Pierre Gasly, you feel like you really know his world. It’s a luxurious place full of high end fashion, stunning locations and food you want to eat off the page, and the embossed Munken Lynx Rough Natural White cover is your invitation to enter it.
What’s next for sports indie mags?
Magazines like these seem likely to get more popular and more numerous as sport continues to reshape and evolve. Their success seems to show there is an appetite among readers for beautiful objects and well-crafted content to tell the sports stories that have so far gone untold.
Expect to see music, food, business, and tech all having their turn to get the sports treatment in print in the near future.
If you are considering creating a printed magazine, journal or zine of your own, Park’s team can help guide the process from concept through to final production. To discuss your project, or simply learn more, get in touch with Park|Graphius here.
Many thanks to Jeremy Leslie of magCulture for his insights and suggestions for this article.
