Million Magazine
Category
Print & Editorial
Mentor
Golan Gafni
Year
2025
Million is a bilingual magazine in Hebrew and Russian, created for children of immigrants from the former Soviet Union. It explores identity, language, belonging, and the experience of living between two cultures through personal stories, visual content, and collective memory.
The Brief
The brief was to create an independent bilingual magazine from concept to production: define a target audience, develop an editorial and visual system, design covers for three potential issues, and produce one complete issue.
The Magazine
Million was created for a generation living between two cultures: children of immigrants from the former Soviet Union who grew up in Israel.
The name refers both to the wave of over one million immigrants who arrived from the former USSR and to the many individual stories, experiences, and layers of identity within that community.
Each issue focuses on a different aspect of this shared experience, using familiar stereotypes as an entry point into more personal and complex conversations.
The Bilingual System
Hebrew is the magazine’s primary reading language, reflecting the language most of its audience uses in everyday life. Russian remains present as a second cultural layer, with a full translated section at the end of each issue.
This keeps the main reading flow clear while making the full content available in both languages.
The Issue
The developed issue, Hard Language, explores the complicated relationship this generation has with both Hebrew and Russian.
It deals with imperfect fluency, accents, embarrassment, and the pressure to speak “correctly” in either language, as well as the way language can become a source of stereotypes and exclusion.
Through personal stories, poetry, and visual content, the issue examines how language shapes both identity and belonging.
