The back page showed a crude interpretation of Leonardo da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man along with a brief description of the magazine’s strategy: The cover was what looked like a computer-generated abstract line image with the text Time Out, London, the date (Aug 12-Sept 2) and the price (1s). The first issue consisted of a single sheet that folded down to 16 A5 pages. It became an A5 fortnightly before going weekly as an A4 magazine in 1970. A second issue followed three weeks later. The early issues were a folded sheet and various estimates put the first issue sales at 3,500-5,000 copies. Harris gained fame as ‘Whispering Bob’ presenting BBC TV’s Old Grey Whistle Test from 1972 (the series was cancelled in 1987 by Janet Street-Porter, who was head of youth programmes, and was divorced from Elliott). Elliott was studying French at Keele University, and the magazine was nearly called Where It's At. It was formulated by Tony Elliott (aged 21) with Bob Harris (aged 22). Time Out had more in common with underground magazines such as Oz or International Times. However, there was little comparison to its potential rivals: it was not weekly, did not use a magazine format, focused on listings rather than features, and was a left-wing agitprop magazine. Time Out cost a shilling when it hit the streets in August 1968. It was a straightforward guide to commercial entertainment for visitors to the capital. The covers usually advertised the latest film and a West End cinema. What’s On in London was a traditional listings weekly, focusing on ‘news, views and notes about all of London’s entertainments’, according to its covers in 1948. Pigott-Brown, nicknamed the ‘sporting baronet’, was an Old Etonian who had inherited a fortune and spent the rest of his life spending it, as a man-about-town and racing enthusiast. In his autobiography, Diary of a Teddy Boy, Mim Scala describes how, along with Sir William Pigott-Brown, he had taken over the name London Life and changed the name to Look of London. The latter was another product of the Swinging Sixties. So, when Tony Elliott was working on his new magazine in 1968, there were just two rivals around: What’s On in London and the Londoner, a renamed version of the features-focused Look of London. At 2/6, it was expensive – five times the price of the Radio Times – and a very upmarket failure. The first issue was in October 1965 but it closed at Christmas 1966. His team included David Hillman and David Puttnam, with Jean Shrimpton as a consultant fashion editor and photographers such as Terence Donovan, Duffy and Ron Traeger. London Life was very much for the Swinging Sixties smart set, of which Boxer was himself a member. London Life was a relaunch of Tatler as a weekly listings magazine under editor Mark Boxer, who had made his name launching the colour supplement at the Sunday Times for Lord Thomson. Among the many titles have been London Mail (1912-26), London Life (1920-60), Piccadilly (1926-29), What’s On in London (1934-77), London Off Duty (1946), Show Business & What’s Doing in London (1950), London Life ( Tatler relaunch, 1965-66), London Look (1967), Look of London (1967), and The Londoner (1968). London has rarely been short of weekly magazines devoted to its events, culture and nightlife. Bob Harris and Tony Elliott were the joint editors What's On in London from June 1959 with a Frankie Vaughan cover for The Heart of a Man filmĬover of Time Out's first issue dated 1968 September 2. is still published with the tagline ‘Discover the world’s coolest cities.’ Elliott was awarded a CBE for services to publishing in 2017 and died three years later. However, it was brought down by online competition, becoming a freesheet and dropping most of its listings in 2012, and closing in 2022. There were several attempts to challenge its dominance, including City Limits and Richard Branson’s Event magazine. Expansion saw spin-offs and editions launched in other British cities and across the world. It did not invent the concept of the events and entertainment listings weekly, but perfected the format. Time Out perfected the city listings magazineįor 50 years, Tony Elliott’s Time Out magazine was a fixture on London’s news-stands.
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