Support Pretty Nostalgic Magazine

My blog champions British wool, the small, independent shops that sell it and all the designers, spinners, dyers and crafters who run small UK businesses keeping the knitting flame well and truly burning. I believe it's important to shop local and let your hard earned cash filter into your local community, not into the coffers of a multi-national megolith, which then gives some to fat cat overpaid shareholders on the back of a sweatshop in a developing country. A fair wage for a fair product is key.

Picture courtesy of Pretty Nostalgic.

That's the mindset too of the gorgeously-designed and produced printed magazine Pretty Nostalgic. It launched in May 2012 and publishes six issues a year. The magazine believes in the principles of creative and sustainable living inspired by the past; happy days from vintage ways; heart-felt living and hand to hand giving; spend wisely; waste less; appreciate more; buy British; and support local businesses. Each magazine, all of which don't have advertising, is a coffee-table style extravaganza of features you wouldn't find in other magazines. They are great to keep and dip into.

As you'd expect, craft and knitting play a great part in the vintage trend and the magazine, whether it's using modern wool and updated patterns to knit vintage-style patterns such as those written by A Stitch In Time doyenne Susan Crawford, or patching and customising pre-loved fashion to make something new.

For that reason I'd urge crafters to to consider subscribing to the magazine and help keep it afloat. Pretty Nostalgic's editor and founder, Nicole Burnett, recently revealed on Facebook that some key funding fell through and the magazine 's future was in doubt. She is determined to keep Pretty Nostaglic going and build up the business, bypassing the big supply chains who take a large percentage of the cover price in return for stocking it.

Happily the magazine's fans quickly showed their support by buying back issues and new subscriptions and issue 13 will be published soon. Yet to sustain the magazine's long-term future more knitting, craft and vintage fans who believe in the magazine's ethos need to put their money where their mouth is. Each issue is £8 - the price of a throwaway paperback book - including postage and packing. It sounds expensive but considering the reader doesn't have to flick through incessant adverts telling her she needs to spend more money on extortionate fashion and beauty it's worth it for the price. Every page has been lovingly produced. I do hope this independent magazine has a bright future ahead of it.