This season’s edition of Park City Magazine is available. And, despite the limitations of COVID-19 social distancing, the publishers were able to deliver an edition that highlights local old-timers, new fresh faces, and things to do during the summertime in the Wasatch Back.

Park City Magazine Editor Jane Gendron admits the publication had to make some adjustments, but she says because so much focus in this summer/fall edition is on outdoor activities, they were able to keep much of their content as they had planned. 

“We shifted gears and writers and photographers all stepped up” she said. “Our team all worked together. We just had to focus on the outdoors a lot, which is easy to do in Park City. You know, we assigned these stories back in January had the draft in early March. So we did have to postpone a few, but we were lucky in that a lot of our big features were focused on the outdoors and things that you can do and experience.” 

Gendron says having a digital presence allows the magazine to still highlight local eateries or indoor activities and remain relevant with shifting conditions caused by COVID-19. The artistic illustrations and photography required a change in approach. 

“We were able to get some last-minute photography particularly with profile subjects, which was great,” she said. “There’s actually one photograph in there, Matt Harrison and Maggie Alvarez. We did a profile of them and how they are a budding culinary empire. And we did it through the glass of their restaurant, you know, with them inside to kind of indicate a little bit of social distancing at the time. Linda Perkins’ son ended up photographing her because we, just at the time, didn’t feel like we could safely be doing profile shots. And then we had illustrations come into play. Our own art director kind of got out her watercolor set and did some illustrations for Larry Warren’s local lore piece on the Glenwood Cemetery.” 

The magazine has features on local golf and reservoirs with the cover highlighting stand up paddleboarding on the Jordanelle Reservoir. 

“Different aspects of golf, disc golf, mini golf and with a focus on publicly accessed golf,” Gendron said. “But also a piece on the private clubs and a couple of pros, Nate Robertson and John De Boer. Like an overall big feature on all the spectacular places you can play. And we did a great piece on our local reservoirs.  And four of them, Jordanelle, Deer Creek, Echo guide. And we have some hiking pieces with local beers. One beer, two beer, three beers, sort of piece. We did kind of a wilderness cocktail hour and we have kind of what to do when you encounter different wildlife on the trail.”

The magazine has a big feature on climate change which talks about the community efforts to reach its carbon-neutral climate goals by 2030. 

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By Carolyn Murray, KPCW