Say Hello, Wave Goodbye
Minus the Pink Flamingo and crying in the rain.
Contrary to the title of this post (unashamedly stolen from Marc Almond), I’m going to begin with waving goodbye. As anyone who knows me knows, I started Sister whilst I was at university. It was 2012, and the magazine came to life through the medium of my final major project. I’m writing this because, after much thought, now feels like the right time for its journey to come to an end.
This hasn’t been easy to write—surprisingly not because I’m emotional, but because I feel like there’s so much to say. Ultimately, doing something for ten years is a long ass time. I’m not the same person I was at 20, and it would be weird if I was. For anyone wondering ‘why’, that is the most simple explanation. But allow me to also give a longer, more nuanced one.
My MacBook circa 2010s—didn’t someone say indie sleaze was back?
My intention was never to run my own magazine—it wasn’t something that crossed my mind, let alone believed to be a possibility. My project got the worst mark I’d ever received whilst at university, including some particularly scathing feedback from my tutor. If you’re a veteran follower of Sister, you may remember I put some of this feedback onto t-shirts as slogans in 2017. Petty or resourceful, you decide. And more recently, me and this particular tutor have crossed paths in the corridors of Condé Nast College of Fashion and Design, where we both now lecture. Full circle validation moment ✔️
However, at the time, this outcome crushed me, and my post-graduation future felt more hopeless than ever. I’ve learned in life that when one door closes (as many of them have), another one always opens. That summer, the buyer at the Tate Modern bookshop purchased all of my student copies (complete with fake barcodes) to sell, and Sister started to take flight. I had no strategy, no experience, no contacts, and most definitely no money. I just knew I, and many others, had some important stuff to say.
My final major project, hot off the printing press and snapped on my state-of-the-art Blackberry.
The initial goal of the magazine was to combine feminism with fashion. I was spending a lot of time reading zines and literature at The Feminist Library or on Tumblr, whilst also buying publications like Dazed, i-D, etc. I didn’t feel that there was an intersection between those two worlds in 2012. I wanted to prove that if you wore make-up and liked clothes, you could still fight for gender equality and women’s rights, contrary to what an older generation of feminists thought.
Writing that in 2023 feels archaic. But things were different back then 👵. Activism and social justice weren’t the norm—the very ‘women’s’ magazines which I created Sister as an antidote to, now write about the same issues which we’ve covered from day one. British Vogue is headed up by a gay man of colour who champions intersectionality and inclusivity through its pages. We’ve survived the ‘This Is What A Feminist Looks Like’ t-shirt phase and come out the other side with a wider understanding of face value tokenism. Diversity and inclusion is literally taught in schools and workplaces, and thanks to TikTok you can find information in seconds that previously you would have to awkwardly ask or laboriously search for.
A lot has progressed but there’s plenty which has remained stagnant, or at worse, regressed. Equal pay isn’t something I’ll see in my own lifetime, TERFs and the British media at large are hellbent on targeting the trans community, and plus size models are still missing from runways. Fashion, journalism, and pretty much any other creative industry remain elitist AF. The game of ‘who you know, not want you know’ (or more like who you’re related to) continues to reign supreme, and the cost of living crisis is only going to prevent more working class people getting their feet through the door. In short, there’s still plenty of work to be done.
So whilst Sister is undoubtedly my biggest success, in some ways it also feels like my biggest failure. It feels like I’m giving up on its mission and what could have been. Deep down I know this isn’t true, and that there are plenty of other ways to participate in activism and push for change. It’s a core part of who I am—the magazine was just an extension of that.
Sister as part of the ‘Unfinished Business’ exhibition at The British Library in 2021.
I never thought Sister would be stocked all over the world, included in exhibitions, written about by the press, have such incredible talent on the covers…I could put together a long list of my proudest achievements. However, if I’m being honest, it never felt like enough. Doing your own thing is hard work. I’m not one to shy away from that, but there’s nobody who will care about your magazine/business/whatever as much as you do. That can be a frustrating, lonely, and sometimes toxic experience. You can lose sight of why you started that thing in the first place.
I’ve always been my own worst critic. I never secured an office space, a permanent team, copious amounts of funding (if anything, I’ve consistently lost money)—and I’ve ruthlessly compared myself to others along the way. Whilst I don’t believe I can alleviate myself from that last one completely, I do feel like stepping away is a good start. After all, nothing can last forever. I want to make room for growth and the person that I am now, rather hanging onto the past.
The Sister social channels and website will remain live for the time being, so please get your orders of any back issues in here. Use the code BYEBABES at the checkout for 50% off everything. Once they’re gone, they’ll be gone forever, and I’d really like to reduce the amount of boxes in my loft. I’ll be slowly transitioning away from using any of the Sister email addresses, so please get me on hello@rebeccajanehill.com going forwards. I’m embracing my full name as apparently there is a much more famous Becky Hill than me (despite the spelling difference). Lastly I want to say the biggest thank you to everyone who has contributed to the magazine, in whatever form, over the years. Bringing people together, and finding a sense of belonging, is truly what has kept me doing this for so long.
The end of an era.
Now for the hello—to Substack! It’s nerve wracking to be doing something as just myself, and not behind the guise of Sister. But I’m also excited at the idea of complete freedom, and room for new possibilities. For that reason, I haven’t defined an angle or a niche for this account (I also haven’t turned on paid for now, but feel free to pledge 🤑). I just want to write about things that I care about, and not have to wait for them to be commissioned (or in most cases ignored/rejected) by a larger publication. So thanks for reading, please subscribe to get these in your inbox every week, and more to come soon. Leave comments, ask any questions you like, and recommend more Substackers to follow.