Meet the New Editor in Chief: Karen Robinson
With the publication of the Spring 2025 issue, the news is now official. PLY Magazine has a new editor in chief.
Jacey has served in that role since PLY began. Don’t worry! Jacey isn’t going anywhere! But the addition of the PLY Spinners Guild and WEFT Magazine mean that Jacey has been making adjustments to her role. Officially, she’s the Publisher and Director of all things in the PLY/WEFT universe. And she very much has a large day-to-day role in the running of each of those entities. But she’s also supported by the rest of the team for PLY, the PSG, and WEFT.
Enter Karen Robinson. That’s me! I’m not new to PLY. Back in 2014 (I got the news on Thanksgiving Day), I started working for PLY as the magazine’s copy editor. The first issue I worked on was the Leicester issue (rather appropriate since BFL is one of my favorite fibers to spin). In 2018, Jacey asked if I wanted to take on more tasks, mostly involving coordinating with the authors. We briefly thought about calling this role Author Wrangler but decided on the more typical (although less exciting) title of Managing Editor.
Since that time, I’ve taken on more and more responsibilities at PLY. The one that has been most exciting is meeting with Jacey and Jillian Moreno (our developmental editor) to decide on the articles for each issue. We’ve updated and revised some of our processes – and updated and revised some more. We’ve added new ideas for article series to the pages of PLY and retired others. Holding the print version of each issue in my hands is always such a delight in thinking about everything that went into putting it together.
So in many ways, this move to editor in chief feels natural in how my role has evolved over my past decade with PLY. And in many ways not much has changed/will change.
Issue development
Jacey, Jillian, and I are still meeting each quarter to put together the contents of each issue. Actually, we have made some adjustments here. Now we meet three times for each issue: once to come up with our dream issue, everything we’d love to see in the issue if we could fit it all in. And now after that meeting, I write up the mood board for that issue. Then we meet closer to the submission deadline to start structuring the issue and turning that dream issue into something closer to reality. And we meet a final time after the submission deadline and make final decisions and assign articles to authors.
Usually after that meeting, Jacey would email authors/potential authors to either clarify an article’s content or to ask if someone would like to write a specific article that we wanted to include but did not yet have a writer for. Contacting authors/potential authors is now my task, and I got to do it already for the upcoming Long Draw issue (Winter 2025), which means I got to make the final decisions on which authors to assign to which articles. None of those were decisions Jacey was against, but it’s possible she would have made slightly different decisions.
Jacey has always been the one to set up the order the articles will appear in each issue, plotting out how a reader might work their way through the articles in a way that makes sense and adds to the experience. I got to do that for the first time with the upcoming Tension issue (Summer 2025). I did get feedback from Jacey afterwards and made a few changes, but for the most part I’ll be making those decisions for future issues as well.
One of the other decisions I have more input on is the selection of the cover for each issue. Although she’s gotten feedback from the rest of us at PLY, Jacey has made the final decisions on the photo/illustration for the cover. For the Hue issue (Spring 2025), I made that decision – and it wasn’t a cover that Jacey hated but it also wasn’t what she would have chosen (as she finds it “too cute”). She wanted to use an image that was similar to the cover way back on the Color issue (we originally used that image on the back cover of Hue but made a change to the back cover to honor Stephenie Gaustad).
Behind the scenes
I’m learning a lot more about the back end of putting together a magazine. Previously, I didn’t deal with the subscription software or the printer at all. Now I’ve gotten really comfortable with that software (good thing my original major in college was computer science!), and I’m much more in the loop with the communications with the printer. I’ve been learning how Jacey decides how many copies of each issue to print and she’s been asking for my thoughts on a lot of the rest of those types of decisions.
For a few months, I answered the emails that came into our customer service email address. Our previous customer service person left the magazine toward the end of last year, and instead of hiring someone else right away, I took on that role. It really helped me see the interactions that happen with you, our readers, and the types of problems that come up (as well as compliments!). Although I’m glad now to turn that job over to our new customer service person, Sarah, it was really good to have that experience so I could learn even more about running all parts of the magazine.
I’m much more involved with the other members of the PLY team, coordinating with everyone to make sure they have what they need to fulfill their work. I’ve been meeting one on one with them, and it’s been so wonderful to get to know each one a little better and have more interaction with them. And I took the lead on the search for our new editorial assistant, reading through the applications, making interview decisions and doing the interviews, and then making the final hiring decision.
Ultimately, although there are some decisions that might be different from what Jacey would have picked, such as the cover art, since Jacey and I have worked so closely (and so well) together for so many years, and will continue doing so, I don’t know that you’ll really notice very many changes to PLY. It will very much remain the magazine you’ve known and loved over the years.
Quick facts about Karen
- Karen has been knitting since 2004, spinning since 2010, and dabbling in crochet here and there
- She and her husband will be celebrating their silver anniversary this year (has it really been that long?)
- They have a teenage son who loves video games (especially Minecraft and Roblox) and history (especially World War II); his career goal is to be a video game designer and create historically accurate games
- They have three Boston Terriers (Luna, Nugget, and Oliver) and two cats (Wall-E and Eva)
- They live in Texas (Karen was born there and left the state for graduate school but returned)
- Karen has a PhD in English, with a focus on medieval literature especially the legends of King Arthur
- She ran a yarn dyeing business, Round Table Yarns, for 6 years (yup, it was Arthurian themed!)
- She designed knitting patterns as well, under KarenDawn Designs, and self-published two knitting pattern books (Gawain’s Shield and Parliament of Cowls)
- She hosted a knitting podcast called T-Shirts and Shawls for a couple of years
- She teaches copyediting classes through the UCSD Extended Studies program
- She copy edits fantasy books, usually by indie authors, although she’s currently not taking on new clients
- She loves to read, especially fantasy and science fiction, and is always happy to help recommend a book in those genres to you
- She really wonders how she finds time for all of the above!
