Wellington, December 19 (JY&A Media) The publisher of Lucire, the only magazine brand licensed from New Zealand, has launched a second title into print, Autocade.
Currently totalling five editions worldwide, Lucire was originally a fashion website launched in 1997 that took the then-unprecedented step of extending its brand into a print format in 2004. Publishing house JY&A Media has now repeated the feat by taking its online car encyclopædia, Autocade, which was launched in 2008, into a print format, initially with a 2024 Yearbook.
It already has the endorsements of former Top Gear and Tomorrow’s World presenter William Woollard and automotive authority and award-winning motoring writer Giles Chapman.
Founder and publisher Jack Yan says he intentionally did not re-create the encyclopædia in print, instead opting for a format that would ensure an informative and entertaining read.
The lavish volume offers in-depth features on cars, including an analysis on current trends, stories on everything from the Citroën 2CV to the Aston Martin DB5, not to mention new models such as the Volvo EM90 and MG Cyberster, as well as reigniting the debate over who designed the Lamborghini Miura. There are features on Pontiac’s advertising artwork of the 1960s, and one on cars from Vietnam, Azerbaijan, Iran, Kenya and Madagascar.
‘It’s a publication for the car enthusiast who expects a story to go beyond horsepower and torque figures,’ says Mr Yan. ‘Autocade also looks at the car’s place in society and history, including design and wider trends.’
He says that after 15 years of publishing the web encyclopædia, he gained useful knowledge of what his readers wanted and the Yearbook complements that.
‘Autocade is in the grand tradition of beautifully produced annuals like World Cars, Car Design Yearbook, Autocourse and Auto Universum, yet offers a deep read for the road car devotee like nothing else I’ve seen,’ says Mr Chapman. ‘It helps you take stock of this rapidly changing automotive world, provokes thought, and feeds the appetite for insight. That it’s been made tangibly real from a digital background only reiterates the big-hearted passion behind it.’
Mr Yan says the Yearbook is proof of concept that his company can deliver yet another publication for potential licensees, as he had done with Lucire.
Currently the Yearbook is being sold directly at JY&A Media’s e-commerce site at lucire.biz, but Mr Yan says he is looking forward to licensing enquiries—and that his company has the capacity to license both titles regularly.
‘Just when you thought that every angle in a car publication had been explored, we were able to come up with something fresh, just as we had done with Lucire two decades ago,’ he says.
Lucire already enjoys a solid licensing history in the Middle East, with Saudi edition Lucire KSA published in English and French.
Images
Autocade Yearbook 2024 cover
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Autocade Yearbook 2024 contents’ pages
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Notes to editors
Autocade and Lucire are registered trade marks of Jack Yan & Associates and may be protected in certain jurisdictions. All trade marks are the properties of their owners and are used in an editorial fashion without any intention to infringe.
About Autocade
Autocade was founded by Jack Yan in 2008 as an online car encyclopædia (autocade.net) after he found many existing references lacking in accuracy. Its contents, limited to a single-paragraph entry for each generation of a car model, are backed up by offline resources and painstakingly researched. It is often quoted by other resources such as Wikipedia. In 2023, a print counterpart was created to provide an informative, entertaining read to complement the original site.
About Lucire
Lucire, the global fashion magazine (lucire.com), started on the web in 1997 from its base in Wellington, New Zealand, the country’s first commercial online fashion magazine. In 2003, Lucire became the first fashion industry partner of the UN Environment Programme (www.unep.org). In 2004, it became the first magazine in its sector to extend its brand into a print magazine. In 2005, it became the first web magazine to be licensed as international print editions.
About JY&A Media
JY&A Media is the independent publishing house behind Lucire and Autocade, founded in 1987 as Jack Yan & Associates in Wellington, New Zealand. Its main titles began online, Lucire in 1997 and Autocade in 2008, before their brands were extended into print editions, Lucire having taken what was an unprecedented path in 2004. It is also responsible for licensing these editions, with Lucire’s first internationally licensed print edition appearing in 2005. Its publishing activities are grouped under Lucire Ltd.
Contact
Jack Yan, Publisher
Autocade
T 64 4 387-3213
E information
@jyanet.com
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