Kids Cover

We have a winner! This year’s Kids Cover Competition received a record number of entries, and our absolute fave was designed by 12-year-old Frankie Kelly from Newcastle: a sunny, funny vision of Santa’s summer holidays. “I thought it would be really cool to combine the Australian lifestyle with Christmas, to create a scene on the beach,” she says of her stunning artwork. “I’m really into pop art and really bright and colourful pieces, and I wanted to use a few different mediums.”

Flip through our latest edition to see more artistic masterpieces from all over the country, featuring reindeers, presents and a Grinch or two. It’s beginning to feel a lot like Christmas…

More highlights in this edition:

• Green thumbs pack a punch: we speak to three Aussie gardeners on the mental, social and ecological benefits of growing a better world.
• Authors Kate Mildenhall, Winnie Dunn, Graeme Simsion and Anita Heiss gift us with their Christmas reflections on family and food, loss and longing.
• Actor Connie Nielsen tells us about returning to a world of ancient Roman spectacle for Gladiator II.
• In Tastes Like Home, Nadine Ingram bakes memories of her grandparents’ orchard into her custardy, welcoming Agrarian Apricot Tart.
• And in Ozzities, we go Round the Twist: shouting out the most bizarre (yet loveable) kids show to ever grace our screens.
• PLUS: The Big Issue’s 2025 Calendar is out now! It showcases vendors and their hobbies in a series of fantastic photos, and some hilarious cartoons by our very own Andrew Weldon. Just $20 – vendors directly earn $12 for every calendar sold.