Everyone was atwitter at the launch of Monocle the other month. And why not? Founder and fearless leader Tyler Brûlé is about as cool as Canadians come—unless you count Jonathan Cheechoo of the San Jose Sharks, and that’s mostly because he grew up in Moose Factory, Ontario—and the magazine billed itself as a hybrid of Wallpaper and the Economist.
It succeeds as such, which is exactly the rub: Monocle is incredibly boring. That's fine. So is the Economist. I love the Economist, but I harbor no illusions about it; I use it instead of sleeping pills on long flights, nodding off somewhere between the Lexington and Charlemagne columns. And Wallpaper, well, it can be interesting. Despite the pleasure of seeing at the pretty designs across the globe, reading it makes me feel poor and fat--and I’m mostly looking at pictures of buildings.
And so, Monocle is a great hybrid of these two magazines. It has some interesting moments, but maybe there’s a reason no one chooses to write about the Norwegian oil boom. And, to be frank, I can’t believe I paid $10 for a magazine that doesn’t even have glossy pages. For the time being, I’ll stick to buying the Economist and whatever tiny bottle of red wine they’re selling in coach.
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