S1, E100: SLUG Magazine/ Craft Lake City - Angela Brown
Salt Lake City’s culture didn’t just happen; people built it piece by piece, often after hours and against the grain. Angela Brown’s path traces that blueprint. Growing up in Emigration Canyon, she craved a wider world than the one she was handed. SLUG Magazine became her portal. Photographs, record stores, and late nights in darkrooms sharpened her craft while the city slowly shifted around her. Music retail taught the business of taste. Journalism gave shape to her voice. Photography glued it all together. These threads converged when she joined SLUG’s tiny team, bringing words, images, and a feel for scenes most media ignored. That mix wasn’t a career ladder; it was a lens on how culture actually spreads.
The turning point wasn’t glamorous. Offered a promotion in San Francisco, Angela had one foot out the door. Then a lunch with her father revealed a terminal diagnosis and a choice. She stayed, bought SLUG, and shouldered caregiving while scaling a two-color zine into a statewide platform. Those early years were pure grind: delivering stacks, selling ads, editing copy, shooting shows, and working night shifts in a darkroom to cover the loan. The Olympics came with promise but less payoff than hoped in a post–9/11 landscape. Still, the mission clarified: make space for outsiders, amplify DIY voices, and prove that local stories can carry national weight.
As Salt Lake evolved, so did “underground.” Once, hair color telegraphed your scene. Now genre borders blur. SLUG embraced that fluidity without losing its edge, covering hardcore and hyperpop, metal and mainstream, even weighing in on a Taylor Swift album with thoughtful criticism. That stance—curious, inclusive, and local-first—attracted a small army: editors, designers, delivery drivers, and over a hundred volunteers. The infrastructure matters. It’s how a city hears itself. It’s how a teenager finds a zine, a band finds a photographer, and a hobbyist becomes a writer who can actually get published.
Craft Lake City emerged from the same urgency: artists needed places to be seen and sell. Galleries were limited, markets were sparse, and many creators felt they had to leave Utah to grow. So Angela launched a festival that blurred lines between artisan and artist, pottery and prints, circuitry and silk-screen. Affordable, accessible, and proudly local, the DIY Festival became a gateway for thousands of makers and shoppers each year. Workshops followed to turn spectators into participants—because practice turns curiosity into skill. During the pandemic, the team even built a virtual festival world, onboarding exhibitors as 3D booth designers overnight. That hack wasn’t a stunt; it was a statement that creative communities can adapt without losing soul.
Today, SLUG and Craft Lake City anchor a broader ecosystem: STEM pavilions, lettering conferences, holiday markets, and partnerships that keep money and momentum local. Sponsors back it because the audience is real and the outcomes are visible: artists stay, neighborhoods hum, and the city feels like it belongs to more of us. The lesson is simple and hard: if the culture you want doesn’t exist, build it. Start with a small circle and a consistent cadence. Publish the story. Hang the show. Teach the class. The underground isn’t what people don’t know; it’s what people are waiting to discover. With the right scaffolding, a zine becomes an institution, a craft table becomes a marketplace, and an outsider finds their center. That’s the work. That’s the win.
Listen to full episode :
