Introducing Fluffy, a gentle magazine for all ages. Fluffy is a collection of images of adorable animals doing sometimes silly things and was created to be a source of joy and happiness, completely free from ads and screens. Along with the images are a collection of poems that make Fluffy a little bit artsy, a little bit poetic, and a whole lot of goofy fun. Fluffy is for your kids, and your grandparents, and anyone in between who could use a little extra happiness in their life.

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My name is Micah, and Fluffy was originally created for my mom, who has advanced Dementia and has very limited options for what kind of media she can view. Most books and magazines are too complex, screens are confusing and sometimes inappropriate, and TV comes with a whole raft of problems. Seemingly innocent programs (like most nature documentaries) often have violent and upsetting imagery that she just doesn’t understand. Commercials are very unpredictable and even classically “wholesome” shows like Star Trek or The Andy Griffith Show can have interpersonal drama that upsets and confuses her. 

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This situation led my wife, May, and I to come up with Fluffy. We used AI to create the cutest images we could think of. When we printed a spiral bound collection of these images it immediately became my mom’s favorite thing in the world. She rarely lets it out of her grasp and shows everyone she meets. Because it does not rely on a narrative, she can open it to any page and be filled with delight at what she sees. She reads the poems with dramatic flair and howls with laughter at the absurd scenes inside. The delight it brings her is what inspired us to share Fluffy with the world.

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When we started to show Fluffy to our friends and family, we were taken aback at the response. Every single age group was tickled. Stoic friends were sent into giggle fits. Parents especially loved the “reverse storytelling” aspect of Fluffy where the detail and creativity of each image naturally led to a magical “tell me the story of this picture” interaction with their children.

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When we set out to find the best way to share Fluffy, we looked at a lot of ideas. Art book, app, social media, individual prints. What we found was that print was a must. Not only is print more emotionally impactful, but the advantages of not staring at a screen were significant. We chose the magazine format because the printing and mailing infrastructure was so advanced and efficient that we can deliver Fluffy for a fraction of the cost that a retail art book would cost…even at equal or better image quality! You can also do things with magazines that you can’t with an app. We left half of the images without text so you can cut up Fluffy and frame individual pages (macaroni and construction paper art, anyone?) or use the images in a collage. They can be cut into paper dolls or puppets, images to trace or paint over, or turned into a brightly colored mobile.

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Finally, that comes to where we are. The minimum order quantity for the really good magazine printers is 1000, and it really only starts to become financially viable at around 1500-2000. We are launching a Kickstarter to get together a group of cute animal enthusiasts to get Fluffy #1 printed. If that is successful, we will set up Fluffy as a regular subscription magazine and make it our life’s work to create the most incredible, adorable, silly and sometimes weird pictures we possibly can.