Hi my name is Diana and I'm a 3rd year student at the London college of fashion doing a magazine for teen black girls, between the ages of 18-24. I'm posting this to get some thoughts on angles, directions etc, what sort of things should I included.?When I was growing up I was obbsessed by fashion and beauty but had to bypass all the make-up/hair tips as it's just not catered to my skin tone or race. I believe this has to be changed, and I know their is pride magazine, but it's aimed at older women i think, and black beauty/black hair is again just about hair and not really lifestlye. Black girls lifestyle differ clearly from white/asian girls lifestyles and i want my magazine to represent that. if anyone could give some ideas in what they think is missing in the black media lifestlye print market please say a few words. who do you think I should feature, as british african/caribeans (spelling) what do we need to see in our magazine. what kind of language would you like to be addressed in. a magazine that is just about, hair, music or baby mama drama is surely not enough. how should the magazine look? arty like i.D or Dazed and Confused or glossy like Glamour and Elle?maybe the focusing not just on rnb and hip-hop but maybe alternative music or fashion...what is missing, please give me a few words as you help is greatly appricated!
thanks Diana Yeboah

hi Diana, you asked so prepare for a long answer!

it was my dream to set up a black female magazine for girls either between that age 14 - 18 and then 19 - 27.

I thought a majority of black girls had their own style that was not illustrated in magazines and two a lot of blacks girls were seriously pretty so it was easy. Other reasons was that I was frustrated with the current black british magazines who seem to refuse to take decent pictures of black women - it seems they can take ok pictures of light skinned women but dark skinned women would come out looking jacked. No matter what complexion they all seem to these abstract weird hairstyles on their head or weird 80's style make up - not just for a feature but all the time. It's weird because in real life a lot of black women have a lot of class and style and you never get that impression or a reinforcement of that from these magazines....

Anyway, this leads me to my point: I have bought lots and lots of magazines over the years, white and black - and the thing that black magazines do not seem to realise is that the pictures are the most important feature.

If you have excellent photo on the cover the magazine will sell. If you open the magazine and you have excellent pictures of black women / girls your magazine will sell. If you have excellent pictures of black women / girls looking stylish with great lighting and acne airbrushed out your magazine will sell.

It really is that simple. If you ever buy vogue for example or anything all the way down to Company magazine you'll see that a majority of the space (every month) is taken up by pictures and most of those have a white womans face or some part of her anatomy. It's a psychology that is used to sell the magazine.