We’ve got something of a love affair with zines, it’s no secret, because there’s honestly nothing more authentically ‘youthful’ than passion and dedication for a subject materialised in paper form by your very own hands. For the few of you with the creative calling to make something exceptionally amazing, there’s an entire community of zine makers and lovers out there waiting for you.

Brighton annually hosts a zine fair around this time of year and it’s a must for all real zineheads. But if you’re kicking yourself because you missed it this time round then don’t worry, all you need to recreate the event are some self-inflicted paper cuts, a newly purchased glossy magazine (to fill the air with that fresh paper smell), then just sit back and read on.

Photos by Louie Frith

This is how the day started.

While I was having a fag break I met these two. I really can’t remember their names, which is pretty bad, but they were really friendly and the girl gave me a rizla.

This is Frank. He decided the photo of the Zinefest sign would be a lot better if it had him in it because he is, in his words, a “sweet piece of ass”.

This is a team of zine creators from the fair. They were probably the youngest there and the least hippy like. I liked them, they had some really cool badges for sale.

This guy reminded me of Rupert the bear so I had to take a photo of him. He wanted to pose with his current zine swaps but then some girl decided she was going to get all involved in the background.

This was the badge making crew. You could spot them because they were the quiet ones in the corner next to the big badge making machine. They seemed really happy with their lot, but I felt pretty sorry for them because no one was really buying any badges.

This was the best cuppa I’ve had for a long time and they had a really nice biscuit selection.