Zara enters publishing together with Wallpaper magazine

Spanish fast fashion brand Zara, part of the Inditex group, is venturing into a new area: Together with British magazine Wallpaper, which specialises in design, architecture, fashion, travel, art and lifestyle, it has launched a 300-page coffee table book titled “Where to now”.

It is actually a box set of five photography books for “would be adventurers” according to Zara. In the spirit of travel and adventure, each volume is dedicated to an off-the-beaten-track destination: Bruton in the green southwest of England, California's Ojai in the Topatopa Mountains, Galicia in northwestern Spain, the Japanese island of Naoshima, and the Namibian capital of Windhoek.

According to Zara and Wallpaper, the coffee table book is meant more as a “travelogue than a travel guide” and also includes various notes that, along with the photos, are aimed at both the “armchair traveller and the enthusiastic explorer”.

“Carefully crafted images and texts that suggest a calmer pace of life and offer peaceful encounters with stores, hotels, people, alleys, street vendors and small architectural wonders,” explains the Zara and Wallpaper team.

The essays were written by Wallpaper editors Simon Mills and Pei-Ru Keh, and contributors Celeste Chipperfield, Jens H Jensen and Mazi Odu. The destinations were photographed by Salva López and Luis Díaz Díaz for the Galicia volume, Sophie Green for Bruton, Den Niwa for Naoshima, Kent Andreasen for Namibia and Pia Riverola for Ojai.

The coffee table book costs 79.95 euros and is available via the Zara website. The respective photo volumes can also be purchased individually at a price of 17.95 euros. In addition to the photo books, Zara also sells notebooks for 9.95 euros, mini notebooks for 5.95 euros and posters for 25.95 euros with the motifs from the photo books.

Although Zara Home has previously offered stationery, it remains to be seen whether Inditex's flagship brand Zara will venture into publishing in the future. In any case, the brand seems to want to get rid of its fast fashion image and has entered, for example, a supply deal with the Infinited Fiber Company, launched a detergent that reduces microfibre shedding and offers a resale programme, repair service and charity opportunies through Zara Pre-Owned.

The brand has also started a new beauty line, Zara Beauty, and the line Zara Atelier with only two collections per year as well as collaboration with brands like Clarks, Ader Error and others.

Customers seem to like it as Inditex (not least through flagship brand Zara) is experiencing record highs in terms of revenue and profits.