Since March I’ve been an Editorial Intern for Wonderland & Rollacoaster Magazine, and I have to share my experience thus far.
For those of you that don’t know Wonderland is a London based arts magazine that covers everything from fashion, music, design, and culture. Rollacoaster is printed under same publisher and includes essentially the same themes. Living in the digital age that has decreased the need or want for printed publications, it is amazing to see both of these 200+ page magazines get published and still flourish. I was excited to be a be apart of that even in a small way as an intern.
When some people think of interns they think bottom of the barrel, the ones who are there to fetch the coffee and do all the jobs no one else wants to do, which is true in some cases but not with the time I’ve spent with Wonderland. On my second day I was coming up with questions to e-interview a designer about her MA collection and recent exhibition she was having. From then on I was writing for a section of the website called “New Noise.” A new noise is basically showcasing an artist or band about their music, influences, projects, and upcoming works. So it’s a simple interview feature for the website. I’ve also wrote audio and video premiere’s as well, which as a music journalist is something I enjoy doing and is my forte.
For most of the New Noise pieces I’ve wrote, the online editor would arrange for me to email the questions to the artist or band which gives less pressure of having to interview someone in person or over the phone. I’ve interviewed people in person before and do not find it that nerve-wrecking so will like to have the opportunity to do so for Wonderland in the future. I did however interview three different people over the phone which was a new experience for me. I actually found that a bit awkward because it’s harder to connect and feel out someone’s vibe over the phone. But all of them went well and one is for my first article in print which will be in this Spring/Summer edition of Wonderland.
Although all of the content I’ve done has been fairly the same kind of thing, each piece has pushed me to evolve my writing voice. It is always exciting and rewarding for me to see something I wrote get published through Wonderland’s recognized name. The online editor Laura is trusting and right away assigned me pieces to write for the website which made me feel valued. Other assignments I’d get would be helping out editors with either research or transcribing interviews. Transcribing is not as easy as I thought, and I understand why it’s an “intern job.” It’s tedious and takes a whole lot of time but I didn’t mind it. Some of the interviews I’ve transcribed were interesting and mindful which made the process easier.
If it was one thing that was trying for me was the lack of sleep and tiredness I’ve had these past couple months. I was still working my full time job and interning at the same time. Although I decreased my hours I had to work at night and on the weekend, basically working 7 days a week. I had to work at least 2 night shifts, so I went to my internship during the day then went to work at the pub at night. That means I was working 14 hour days sometimes. In the first two weeks I thought it was killing me. I got used to it and felt good doing this for myself and my career. I’m not going to get where I want without more sacrifice and more days running on 6 hours of sleep or less.
I met with the editor who basically hired as an intern for coffee a few weeks ago to talk about my time there so far. One thing I asked him was about the possibility of being hired as a staff writer and he gave me some good advice. He said that I need to make myself indispensable here. Constantly pitching, thinking of articles or ideas that are new and creative will make the publisher notice my potential writing for the magazine. The two editorial assistants there were hired from being interns because of that. In the midst of doing what I’m assigned, I’m working on somethings to make my mark. If not at Wonderland, somewhere else.
-C