Decisions, decisions

One of the gifts that I got from K this year was a year's subscription to any magazine of my choice. Seems pretty straightforward, but when you take into account how many magazines I read and love, it definitely gets hard.

Should I go with something that I would not otherwise be able to afford? K said that he was aware that I might choose an expensive magazine, but I don't think he took into account how spendy art and import magazine subscriptions can be. My top choice in this category would be the Australian foodie mag, Delicious, at $143.48 a year. The only thing I like more than eating yummy food is reading about it, and this magazine is the ultimate in food porn.

Should I add to the piles of magazines I have to keep forever by choosing a design magazine? Architectural Record, Communication Arts, Print, Interior Design, Contract, Hospitality Design, I.D.... I could go on and on, and I'm not sure that I'm even going to able to whittle down this category. The one thing to note here is that I could always buy these subscriptions myself and deduct them since they have to do with my work.

Perhaps I should go with something that I'm a little embarrassed to buy in public and would certainly never buy in view of my peers. The top choice here would be O, The Oprah Magazine. I'm a sucker for her brand of self-empowerment and self-improvement, and while I do think her personality is a little bit much at times, I do think she has helped many people in many different ways, me included. The magazine itself is useful, well-edited and pretty, and has all the girly stuff that I need to know about without making me feel like I'm being sold to constantly (though I am fully aware that everything is a sell in some way or another.)

I could go for volume and choose a weekly. Going to my mailbox after work and finding a magazine waiting for me brings me no end of joy. Having one there every week would increase my happiness and so this might be the best choice. Because I don't think I could deal with a potentially depressing news magazine every week, if I go for a weekly, it would have to be Entertainment Weekly.

A choice that would help me kill two birds with one stone would be a travel magazine. That way I could figure out where in the world I am going to escape to this year. I currently receive Travel & Leisure, but sometime in the last couple of years, the articles became less interesting and the layout more cluttered. Plus they use really cheap paper, making the photo spreads less enticing. I already get National Geographic Traveler and Budget Travel, but those magazines are more about the practical stuff...I want to open a travel magazine and salivate. The two magazines that fit the bill are Conde Nast Traveler, which I think is a much better magazine than Travel & Leisure, and Travesias. Travesias is a Mexican magazine that is gorgeously put together with thick glossy paper and beautiful photography. Plus, because it's written in Spanish, it seems even more exotic and worldly and I can rationalize that choosing it will help improve my Spanish. Though if I choose Travesias, I will most certainly go to Mexico or some other Latin American country.

The one magazine that combines a lot of the above is Wallpaper*. I have a strange relationship with this magazine in that I both love and hate what it represents. I love the art, architecture, travel, design, and gadgetry that it endorses, but sometimes, I feel it represents an impossible standard of life that most people, including me, don't have and will never have, and is a little bit too shallow and materialistic. I'm a designer, but even I recognize that the singular pursuit of glossy beauty without inner meaning or purpose can leave you pretty empty. So, if I chose Wallpaper*, it would be BYOS...bring your own soul.

So what will I choose? I'm going on a fact-finding mission later this week (Barnes & Noble and Hennessy + Ingalls on Sunday after my cupcake meetup), so I'll let you know. If you have any suggestions, feel free to chime in.