Practical Parenting redesigns at 20

Practical Parenting has celebrated its 20th birthday with a design influenced by the prominence of parenting advice and information online. The IPC monthly for parents of new-borns to pre-schools, has introduced more real-life experiences from parents and directly reflects the issues discussed on its website forums. Editor Susie Boone said: ‘New media has changed parenting; it has had an enormous effect. Parenting websites are hugely popular for exchanging information and we are trying to reflect that in the magazine. There are whole online communities made up of parents, so some of our pages are given over to chat with parents. It has a community feel.’Boone said the major change of the past 20 years has been the disappearance of the traditional family structure. ‘Parents are more isolated – that’s reflected in the magazine, that they are going through this on their own. Plus people have their own ways of doing things, it’s not a question of right and wrong any more. We’re really becoming involved in this by upping the real-life stories and experiences in the magazine.’The redesign seeks to give the magazine a more contemporary look, with a wider coffee-table size; new colour palette and fonts; a greater emphasis on photography and a new logo.

Boone, who joined the magazine six months ago, said the issues that parents are interested in have not changed in two decades of publishing. ‘The dilemmas are the same – about sleeping, feeding your child in a healthy way – parents are still concerned with children’s behaviour so it’s about dealing with what are still key issues in a contemporary way.’The new look will be introduced in the March issue of the magazine, which goes on sale from 1 February.