Culture is not static. It breathes, shifts, and adapts—picking up new layers of meaning while preserving its core. Like the patina that forms on copper, these transformations don’t diminish the original material but become integral to its character and beauty.

Our vision

Patina documents the evolution of cultural practices, exploring how traditions transform to stay alive. We believe that preservation and adaptation aren’t opposing forces—they’re part of the same survival story. Through careful documentation and storytelling, we track how communities maintain their essential character while responding to changing circumstances.

Our quarterly themed volumes combine personal narratives with reportage, and build both an archive and a methodology for documenting cultural evolution in real time.

We focus on the multidirectional ways cultures move through time: preservation through practice, cross-temporal dialogue, memory and recovery, and digital transformation. We publish works that shine a light on how people maintain and deepen traditional practices in contemporary settings, how eras speak to each other, how people reconstruct and reconnect with cultural practices and how practices migrate between physical and digital realms.

Our approach

Each story in Patina combines careful documentation with thoughtful analysis. We believe in:

Deep observation: We pay attention to details that might seem minor but reveal larger patterns of cultural evolution: the specific way a shopkeeper arranges their display, the subtle modifications to a traditional tool, the new words that enter an old ceremony.

Historical context: We research and present the historical context of practices, showing how current adaptations fit into longer patterns of evolution.

Personal narratives of cultural continuity: We value individual stories that reveal how people navigate cultural preservation in their own lives.

Our editorial vision

Patina seeks stories that:

• Document specific instances of cultural adaptation rather than broad trends
• Show rather than tell, through rich detail and careful observation
• Recognise complexity without losing clarity
• Balance appreciation for tradition with openness to change
• Avoid both romanticism and cynicism

Unlike publications that either mourn the loss of tradition or celebrate change uncritically, Patina recognises cultural evolution as a natural and necessary process. We document how communities actively negotiate between preservation and adaptation, maintaining their essential character while responding to new realities.

The team