When I started Archinect 20 years ago, in the summer of 1997, the internet was still many years away from becoming a replacement for newspapers and magazines. Since then, the media landscape has changed drastically, with most print publications now dedicating the majority of their time and budget to their digital platforms. Today we consume media in a different way than we have ever done in the past, for better or worse. We expect more content, with higher quality, but human nature tends to give in to the quick and gratifying. Journalism has struggled to monetize quality investigations and writing as sites like Buzzfeed have proven that listicles, fun photos, and quick content bites offer a much greater return in dollars and followers.

We’re all watching this trend quickly seep into architectural media. Why devote time and money to creating thoughtful long-form content when online audiences tend to flock toward easier reads? This isn’t a rhetorical question. From a business perspective, it usually doesn’t make any sense at all—at least not in the way that media is getting produced and consumed today.

We don’t think it has to be a choice. We don’t need to pick a direction. We can satisfy our reader’s cravings while they wait for a render to complete, and still give them something more substantial to inspire and enlighten at the end of a long work day. As a publisher, we believe it’s our responsibility to not just entertain but also elevate and enliven the profession’s discourse by maintaining a high standard for editorial.We will publish in print from the perspective of a digital-first and digital-only publication, taking the lessons we’ve learned from pioneering new media

Ed, a new print magazine that we’ve recently announced on Archinect, is an experiment in how to evolve architectural publishing. We will revisit print, in a new way, years after most traditional print publications have shifted away from a medium that many have written off. We will publish in print from the perspective of a digital-first and digital-only publication, taking the lessons we’ve learned from pioneering new media, and applying them to an age-old format that offers a different type of value.

Ed will be a place to curate thoughts on specific themes relevant to the time of publication. The content will be produced by invited contributors, Archinect editorial staff, public submissions and from activity on Archinect. It will be a hybrid publication, co-existing with the interactive, community-based platform that Archinect nurtures, while growing into an archive of material that will generate a clearer perspective of our industry over time, at a different scale than the internet naturally facilitates. Ed will charge forward into new territory while taking inspiration and elaborating on trends from Archinect’s dedicated community of participants and contributors.

In the spirit of experimentation, we will be commissioning a different graphic designer to design each quarterly issue and logo treatment in response to the issue’s theme. The size and general format will stay consistent, but each issue will be a product of evolution, moving forward with new ideas and further developing previous ideas that stick. At the rate of change we’re watching media transform, it’s naïve to think we can create something now that will be relevant in a few years, so we will strive to adapt nimbly, as necessary.

We have decided to extend our call for submissions for this first issue, to May 9, 2017. We have also opened a call for submissions for 10 free architectural advertisements to explore the art of self-promotion and branding. If you would like to be a part of this exciting new project, please read our calls for submissions. We look forward to reviewing all submissions and starting new conversations.