THIS YOU, a new personalized print fashion and culture magazine, has launched its first issue, Autumn in New York.
Unlike a conventional magazine, where thousands of readers receive exactly the same object, every copy of THIS YOU is different.
The editorial stories remain the same, but the fashion imagery is personalized around the individual reader. Their name appears on the cover, and throughout the magazine they become the person inside the fashion world they would normally only observe.
The result is a 32-page physical magazine that is generated individually, printed, bound and shipped as its own edition.
“Fashion magazines have always been built around desire and aspiration. You look at another person wearing the clothes, living somewhere else, being someone else. I wanted to see what happens when the magazine removes that distance and puts you inside it instead.”
The project explores what personalization means when it leaves the screen.
Digital platforms increasingly adapt themselves to every individual user, from recommendation feeds and advertising to shopping and entertainment. Printed media, by contrast, still largely operates through identical mass-produced copies.
THIS YOU combines those two models: the structure and physical permanence of a printed magazine with the individual variation usually associated with digital products.
Each issue is built around a different season and city. Issue 01, Autumn in New York, is the first publication in the series.
A digital version is also accessible through the magazine, but the physical object remains central to the project.
THIS YOU was created by internet artist and independent creator Jānis Kauss, whose wider practice under Absurd.website uses functional websites, services, startups and digital products as artistic material.
Issue 01 is available now as a personalized print and digital edition at thisyoumag.com.
