|
Magazines
How to be cool in BeijingPosted by Joel Martinsen, September 2, 2008 12:32 PM
The August issue of 0086 promotes itself as a guide to the coolest stuff in Beijing. It's almost 300 pages worth of photos and articles about trendy people and places in the city. 0086, a glossy lifestyle magazine, piggy-backs on the publication license of Music Magazine (音乐大观), which is found on newsstands these days under the title Not Only Music (非音乐). It was launched at the end of 2007 by Song Ke, head of the Taihe Rye record label. Super Girl Li Yuchun, one of the label's artists, has been featured on the cover of two issues of the supplement 0086 Materialist (0086物质客), which isn't included with this issue. Judging from the magazine's content, advertising, and distribution network, it seems to be targeted at young, urban 20-somethings: the consumers of the "post-80s" generation. Here's the English-language promo text from the back of the August issue, "Most Beijing" (their translation for 最北京):
That pretty much describes what's inside. There are brief interviews with famous Beijing denizens like Ai Weiwei, Hung Huang, Guo Degang, Muzimei, Shi Kang, and Han Han; tilt-shift miniature photographs of landmarks captioned in characters and pinyin; blog posts about city life, and capsule reviews of major restaurants, bars, and other destinations. Much of the magazine is taken up by photos of people who live and work in Beijing, ranging from bun makers and retired blue-collar workers to designers and shopowners. Plus a "sexy Beijing" section featuring loads of pretty people in their early twenties who explain what they like best about the city. Why all this expires in 2018 the magazine doesn't say. That's the year Beijing is supposed to achieve modernization and reach the standard of cities in developed countries (according to China's master plan for sustainable development), but that shouldn't put an end to the cool, should it? Links and Sources
|
Partner Links
Jobs in China
Recent Comments
Gareth on
Gamble your life away in ZT Online
Inst on
The Mouse looms over Shanghai
Anonymous on
Giant Mao Zedong stands alone in the autumn cold
Joel Marti on
A centenarian monk reads the newspaper
little Ale on
Those damned English experts
China Media Timeline
Major media events over the last three decades
Danwei Model Workers
![]() Recommended blogs and new media
Books on China
Xujun Eberlein's Apologies Forthcoming: Hong Kong's Blacksmith Books has published a short story collection by Xujun Eberlein.
Princess Der Ling: Two Years in the Forbidden City: Two years in the Forbidden City is largely a reminiscence of the minutiae of life for one of history's most powerful women, by one of her court attendants, a Manchu noble's daughter by the name of Der Ling.
Carl Crow's The Long Road Back to China: In 1939 Carl Crow - an American journalist, advertising executive and author who had lived in Shanghai for 25 years until forced out by the Japanese - travelled up the Burma Road from Rangoon to Chongqing on assignment for Liberty magazine - 'the most interesting assignment I have ever been given'.
Front Page of the Day
A different newspaper every weekday
From the Vault
Classic Danwei posts
+ The Dazhai Spirit gets religion (2007.10): In a Window of the South (南风窗) feature on model village Dazhai (大寨), Li Xiangping (李向平) writes about the role religion, in the form of the Pule Temple, plays in the village's changing identity. + Will the Boat Sink the Water? a review by Göran Leijonhufvud (2006.11): Göran Leijonhufvud, former China correspondent of several Scandinavian newspapers, is now researching village elections in minority nationalities areas in Yunnan. + One Country, Two Versions (2005.02): CEPA eases co-productions between the mainland and Hong Kong, but does it undermine creativity?
Danwei Archives
Danwei Feeds
Via Feedsky
or Feedburner |






Comments on How to be cool in Beijing
You'd have to pay me a lot of money to live in Beijing! But, you go right ahead!
to Magic Dragon
thank god! nobody is gonna pay you to live in beijing. beijing is for elites only, not losers.
"The new beer and skittles of Beijing"
Beijing has Skittlebraw? Well, that is cool. Where do I find it?