Piotr Gruszecki's first zine began as a thank-you. Sixteen photographs, shot on a Fujifilm X100V in the Classic Negative film simulation at the WatchHouse café in London, laid out brochure-style and intended, in his own words, "to gift a run of copies to the café itself". At the end of May 2026 he asked us for guidance on paper and design. What went to press was a 230×150mm stapled photo zine with a gloss-laminated 300gsm silk cover wrapped around 120gsm uncoated inside pages, and it is, frankly, one of the best-judged first zines we have handled.
We first quoted what his enquiry asked for: gloss inside pages. Then the artwork arrived. Piotr had shot with a deliberately warm white balance and asked us to preserve it rather than neutralise it, and he wanted the booklet to "feel premium in the hand". Looking at the pictures, Mike suggested uncoated inside pages would suit the brand and imagery better, while admitting it was the complete opposite of the original request. Piotr leaned the same way and put it better than we could: "outside gloss and shiny, inside warm and welcoming". He offered to be talked into silk, because the zines were going to the owner of the chain as a sample and he wanted them to "feel considered". We stuck with uncoated, for a friendlier, less corporate feel on the page and in the flick-through.
The gloss-laminated cover gives the sheen and scuff resistance a handled booklet needs. Turn it and the mood changes: 120gsm uncoated is soft, matt and tactile, and the Classic Negative colours settle into the sheet rather than sitting on top of it. Warm timber, cream walls, the black of a barista's apron: on uncoated they read like a film print. Mike's verdict from handling the finished copy was blunt enough to repeat: gloss lam cover into uncoated inside pages, copy this.
Piotr's form asked for 14 pages. A stapled booklet is built from sheets folded in half, so every sheet adds four pages and the total has to be a multiple of four; we quoted 16, a 4pp cover plus 12 inside pages, and he used every one of them. The pacing is what a lot of first zines miss. There are full-bleed spreads where the WatchHouse counter runs straight across the gutter, menu board and grinders and all; there are spreads with one photograph and acres of white space; there is a spread carrying four small frames in a grid. The cover, a single image boxed in white under a serif title, sets that restraint from the start.
At sixteen pages on a 120gsm text and a 300gsm cover the booklet lies open on a table, the two staples disappear into the fold and the cover does not spring. Heavier covers on short booklets can fight you; 300gsm silk under a gloss laminate is about the ceiling at 16 pages, and here it behaves perfectly. The 230×150mm page is two millimetres wider than A5 and twenty taller, giving the portrait photographs a little more height.
On Wednesday 3 June, three days after his Sunday enquiry, Piotr ordered 30 copies as three parcels of ten: one for the owner of the chain, one for the café at Seven Dials and one for his home in Kraków. He approved the proof the next morning, the zines left us on the Friday, and both London parcels were delivered on Monday 8 June. The Polish parcel took the scenic route: a missed courier collection, a rebooking, then a spell in customs clearance before it reached Piotr. We chased it every step of the way, and when it landed he wrote: "The parcel arrived — and I'm really happy with the print quality and the paper choices. Thank you!"
⚠️ Parcels into the EU can still be held for clearance, even with the paperwork done, so plan international copies with a few days in hand.
A short-run stapled photo zine, full colour, somewhere between 16 and 48 pages, is one of the formats we print most. For the same thinking at A5, see Ed Mason's A5 music photography zine, and our zine printing page prices every combination of cover and text stock.
Planning a photo zine of your own? Get a price on our Printed Project Builder, or drop Harriet and Mike a line and we will talk through the paper with you.
