Dear Quilly Girls,

When I started Like-Minded Magazine at LMU, I was craving connection. Not just friendships, but creative connections. The type of people who love making and sharing their creative works and who want to inspire and be inspired by others doing the same. People who understand that creativity is better when it’s shared. I didn’t really know how I was going to go about starting this, but that felt kind of perfect coming into a new school. A place where ideas, stories, and weird little artistic experiments weren’t just tolerated but celebrated.

Zines have a history of being loud in all the right ways. Punk kids in the '70s, riot grrrls in the '90s, queer creators, people who didn’t see themselves in mainstream media so they made their own. That’s what I wanted when I started Like-Minded. Since starting out small, we’ve learned and grown into bigger ideas and into themes like Not So Business Casual, exploring everything from underground music scenes to DIY fashion, from queer rituals to anti-aesthetic design. It’s messy, beautiful, weird, and real, just like the people who make it.

Zines have always been that secret handshake for people like me, messy, bold, unapologetic. They’re tiny rebellions, little explosions of DIY culture that say, “Here’s my world, take it or leave it.” These self-made magazines are less about perfection and more about expression. And that’s what hooked me.

Starting Like-Minded wasn’t about making a glossy, perfect magazine but it was about finding my people. Those who felt the same itch to create something by hand, to put their voice out there even if it was messy or vulnerable. Because zines don’t just share art but they build community. For me, Like-Minded became that place. It wasn’t planned or polished; it just grew organically out of those moments of connection. Suddenly, I wasn’t alone with my ideas or my creative restlessness. I was part of a small, fierce crew who made cool stuff because we wanted to, not because anyone told us to.

And that’s the thing: making a zine isn’t just about printing pages. It’s about the night-before deadlines where you’re still editing at 2 a.m. It’s about someone bringing new ideas to the meetings. It’s about flipping through your own work and thinking, “Wait… this is kind of good?”

So if you’ve ever thought about starting a zine, or a blog, or a collage series, or just writing that weird essay you can’t stop thinking about, this is your sign. Make something. Share it. See what happens.

You never know who might be out there, looking for the exact same thing.

xoxo,

Samantha Edelman

(I also totally recommend DreamWorldGirlZine! Such an inspiration.)