Red Loam Magazine

A NEW BEGINNING FOR OUR COMMUNITY

by Melanie Figueroa Zavala

Red Loam: soil that nourishes, soil found in Asia, Africa, South America, Australia and parts of the Mediterranean and central America — soil that is found where culture and diversity flourish. As a magazine, Red Loam envisions a community where culture and diversity are celebrated as a form of reclamation. The publication is based in Idaho: a predominantly white state where identity and culture are defined by homogeneity. In this context, Red loam stands as a space for communities of color to uplift the stories that challenge bigoted rhetoric and narratives while taking ownership of how our stories are told.

Red Loam’s fresh start brings a new beginning for racialized1 communities in Idaho. It is a new beginning for ourselves and for the community we’re hoping to build and reach. This beginning is being felt by our staff first as we work to bring this project to life — as we brainstorm together, check-in at our staff meetings, and conduct our first photoshoot. There is a strong yet calm feeling in the air; it’s empowering to be working in a multicultural staff where each person’s background is respected and celebrated. As much as this feeling invigorates us, there is also a sense of peace inherent to it — we don’t have to overperform or code-switch. We are here to create together.

This feeling is resistance — a resistance to the invisibilization of our communities and to the isolation often experienced by those of us of racialized and queer backgrounds. 

In the words of our staff, Red Loam is a new beginning that is bringing cool people together, giving us a space to commune, and get in touch with our identity: it is our reclamation of art.

Style, Music, Culture, and Community Writer Ani Carnell shares, “Red Loam represents a shift in culture by creating representation for BIPOC and queer stories.” 

Red Loam is a reclamaton of our agency as a Brown collective. It is a community that gives us space to be empowered in our identities, to be curious and creative, and to find joy and whimsy despite the social conflict brought about by what our identities symbolize in such a homogenous place as Idaho. Community building is resistance; in sharing our stories and uplifting queer and BIPOC art, we are building solidarity and creating representation. 

Community Outreach Coordinator Gabby Treadwell says that claiming a space on the internet is also resisting the tech takeover — online presence is part of the representation we must seek.

Whether it be online, social media, or at the physical community level, Red Loam is a gateway to allowing our communities to shine and amplifying diversity and inclusion and, similar to Ani’s view, is inherently resistant to Idaho’s unvaried belief systems. 

Along similar lines of thought, Graphic Designer Julius Bridgeforth sees Red Loam’s resistance in challenging the rise of white Christian nationalist thought, creating a space that welcomes and validates diversity of beliefs. Editorial Manager Jodie Schwicht says being able to create candidly and authentically and to “speak truth to power” is the resistance she sees manifested through Red Loam.

Brown and Black existence in Idaho is inherently non-compliant: it has always held political weight, and having our own reclamation of storytelling and creative freedom in online discourse is powerful. At the same time, simply having and maintaining this vibrant community is the resistance that Photographer December Gonzaga envisions in Red Loam. 

Magazine founder and Chief Marketing Officer Ky Gathura envisions this project as a space that “challenges Idaho’s beige” through cultivating curiosity and uplifting diverse perspectives that “decenters whiteness and creates a space where people can get a jumpstart to find themselves.” Gabby shares these thoughts, seeing the project as a “return to freedom, a return to the community and its organizing origins.” 

Red Loam means something different to each one of us, but one overarching truth is that this is the first publication of its kind in Idaho. It is a community we are building together. All of our members found comfort in having a space to find ourselves creatively without having to subdue or hide our heritage and experiences. For many of us, this is the first time we have been able to do this.

With this new beginning comes a lot of excitement for the new connections we will build with our readers. The message we share with you as a collective is: welcome.

“I hope you find safety in this space. I hope it’s healing. This is for you. Ask questions. Be curious. Love. Be passionate. Show up for your community. We are meant to be a vessel that connects you with exploring yourself and guides you to thrive in your own space. Our door is always open. Sending virtual hugs.”
· Ky

“I encourage folks if you haven’t historically included yourselves in the definition of queer, ask yourself why. Queerness is everywhere and I want folks who are queer to find some safety in knowing that really everything is a little queer, it’s just that there’s been a really good job of bleaching that. Our queerness is a privilege, and those of us who have done the difficult work of what this means in Idaho, let us be the refuge for those still finding themselves. Brown and Black queer rage changes the world.”
· gabby

“Uplifting our communities is important. This is a safe space to embrace and uplift each other.”
· December










“You are not alone, welcome, and stick around for the ride.”
· Julius

“Show up! If you have a creative spark but maybe don’t feel supported in this space, go for it; this is how Red Loam began so I encourage you to show up and start building that community, because there are people that care and will show up for you.”
· ani

“You are seen here. You’re validated here. You’re safe here. We want you here: even if that’s not the messaging that you’re getting in your day-to-day life. I’ve been there … I was born and raised in Idaho, I understand and recall feeling very isolated and alone. We hope that this magazine — this project and this space, this team and community that we’re building — can be a respite and a source of strength and inspiration: for you guys to replenish your will and keep going.” 
· jodie

“Red Loam’s resistance feels like a ray of sunshine peeking through a building storm. As a writer, I want to build with this community through channeling the rage of racialized communities across the globe by bringing them into conversation into our discourse here in Idaho. I’m radically hopeful of what we are building and its potential to heal us — to help us grow ever-loving of ourselves, our identities, and heritage. Bienvenide, welcome <3”
· melanie

  1. I use the terminology to challenge the racial construct imposed; we are not communities of color, we are communities who have been othered through a hierarchy of power that disempowers us based on the “color”of our skin. I strongly believe you should define yourself however you feel the most comfortable. I will continue to use terms like BIPOC, POC, etc. while instilling and reinforcing the “racialized” approach more and more as I write. ↩︎