Wed. May 8th, 2024

10 Year Anniversary Contest

Retro Lovely Magazine debuted on the world stage on March 23rd 2010. The first copies were available to the public at Viva Las Vegas. Over the ensuing months the issue sold out. While the initial run was 2000 copies the publication was seen by and talked about by tens of thousands more. We called it “groundbreaking” on those very pages, and we were right. The name Retro Lovely is nearly synonymous with Pinup and is one of the most recognized brands in that genre. March 23rd 2020 is just ahead of us and will mark our 10 year anniversary. As we approach this milestone and celebrate all we’ve accomplished in that time we have decided to bring you this contest. The Retro Lovely 10 Year Anniversary Contest. To be fair it’s actually two contests. What’s at stake? Not one, but two GENUINE CATHERINE D’LISH ROBES. One of two COVERS of our Old Hollywood Special Edition plus a chance* at a cover for the winners wearing those Catherine D’Lish robes. That’s 2 covers for each of the winners. 
Robe colors will be selected by the winners. Robes will not be ordered until that point and their delivery will be subject to the workload and timelines of Catherine D’Lish.

*Suitable images in the robes that meet our normal publishing quality standards for covers.


What are the details? Well as with any contest there’s a lot of rules and regulations. Here’s the Official Contest Terms, Rules and Regulations: http://retrolovely.com/official-competition-terms-rules-and-regulations/

Here’s our Privacy Policy: http://retrolovely.com/privacy-policy-2/

There is a special submission form for the open contest here: https://form.jotform.com/200003601650131 but you’ll want to review all the info on this page and the Contest Terms page first.

Those taking part in the participating Retro Lovely Partner Studios contest have no action to take, they are entered automatically by those participating Retro Lovely Partner Studios. Click here for a list of those studios to find one near you.http://retrolovely.com/10-year-anniversary-participating-partner-studios/


Partner Studio Contest

  • Images must be shot by a participating Retro Lovely Partner Studio.
  • Images must be new content only. Time stamps will be checked.
  • Images have not previously been published NOR have any other images from the same set been published.
  • Image must be in the designated themes for the contest which Includes Valentine’s, Old Hollywood, Vintage Boudoir, Noir, Vintage Glamour or Femme Fatale. PLEASE review our samples below. Both black and white as well as color images will be accepted.
  • All images submitted by our participating Partner Studios will automatically be approved for publication in the Old Hollywood and Valentine’s Editions and will have a chance at the grand prize.
  • Images from Retro Lovely Partner Studios will be voted on by all Retro Lovely Partner Studios. Each partner studio will get three votes- and will only be allowed one vote for one of their own images. Two rounds will occur. First round will narrow down images. Second round of voting will be done the same and narrow down to the winner.
  • All images will be submitted no later than April 30 – by our participating Retro Lovely Partner Studios.
  • Winner announced on May 9th. Grand Prize = 1 of 2 Catherine D’Lish Robes valued at $500.

We always have the problem of providing enough information to be complete so people have all the info they need but often in doing so many people skim over that info and miss things and end up asking questions anyway. We know the dates will be something people will ask about (even though it’s above) so here’s a concise graphic on that. Timelines are different for each of the 2 contests.

Open Contest

  • Open to anyone in the world where not in conflict with any applicable laws. Legal eligibility shall be determined on the part of the party submitting to the contest. We do not have the ability to pre-determine this for every country of the world.
  • To participate contestants must submit never before published, professionally shot images (this includes unreleased photos from the same session that may have been published) in a style of Valentine’s, Old Hollywood, Vintage Boudoir, Noir, Vintage Glamour or Femme Fatale. PLEASE review our samples below
  • There is a submission fee of $10 per entry which may contain multiple images for publication. One primary image will be identified for the voting process. Anyone discovered to have submitted images from a set that was previously published will be disqualified and they will forfeit their submission fee. Paying the submission fee does not guarantee publication or acceptance into the contest. No refunds will be issued if submitted material is not accepted.
  • Models who have appeared in prior issues of Retro Lovely and have purchased copies of those issues may submit a selfie holding those copies for a $5 refund on the submission fee.
  • There is NO SUBMISSION FEE for the first 50 participants who have been in an issue of Retro Lovely and include a selfie holding that copy. If you just ordered an issue you were in but have not gotten it simply upload a purchase receipt for that copy. Receipts must show date, your name and a transaction number. If you pre-ordered a copy from us, we can verify this, if you purchased directly from our printer MagCloud only you would have that info.
  • Primary image will be uploaded to an online voting gallery where fans may cast one vote per day for their favorite models (they can cast multiple votes). This will be online and available to share by January 4th.
  • Participating parties must post and share the Official Retro Lovely 10 Year Anniversary promotional materials on their social media pages to remain in the contest running. It is the graphic on the top of this page.
  • Submissions will be accepted through March 23rd 2020, the 10 year anniversary of the launch of Retro Lovely.
  • Voting will remain open through April 15th.
  • 10 finalists with the most votes will then move on to a final round with a reset to zero where all representative images will have equal time to to be voted on to running from April 18th through May 5th.
  • Winner announced on May 9th. Grand Prize = 1 of 2 Catherine D’Lish Robes valued at $500.
  • Models may enter multiple times. HOWEVER, voting is PER IMAGE, if you enter multiple times the votes on all those submissions WILL NOT be combined. Is there another reason this may be attractive to some? Perhaps at the contest start you have only so many eligible photos to submit, weeks later you do a shoot and have a photo you feel is much more strong and able to garner more votes than your original submissions, in this way it would make sense. It’s also possible you aren’t sure what images of yours would get the most attention from strangers voting, you may actually have noticed this in the past where you share an image you like and people go wild over it then another you think is your best ever gets far less love. In this way having multiple images in the competition could give you that peace of mind.

Theme Samples

As we began to gather examples for the themes we quickly realized how, with the exception of the Valentine’s Edition, they are are nearly interchangeable with some subtle distinctions. That makes sense too since in the early discussion with our partner studios only actually proposed an “Old Hollywood” Special Edition. Which is what we are calling it. Below are google searches for Old Hollywood, Vintage Boudoir, Noir, Vintage Glamour and Femme Fatale. At first glance you can see how they are all related.

These galleries are samples we brought together to show the styles. Valentine’s is not shown as that should be obvious to all.

Old Hollywood and Vintage Glamour are nearly interchangeable. You can see there’s a lot of close cropped images, headshots, photos that look like they could be promotional photos for an actress. This means it’s also quite likely this category is great for burlesque performers who have such images.

Vintage Boudoir is actually pretty obvious, models in a boudoir setting with vintage attire, styling, and props.

Noir and Femme Fatale are also virtually the same thing. Think cinematic looking images from bygone eras. Mostly they tend to be darker in tones.



FAQs (More added as they arise)

Q. UGH, there’s a submission fee to enter the open competition?
That’s not very open.
A. Yes there is. We are a small publication. We make virtually no money compared to the time we put into this. This promotion will attract a lot of attention and generate a mountain of work for us. We will get barraged with submissions from people who feel “what have I got to lose?”. Too many of them will have that same attitude when it comes to adhering to our requirements. Years ago we had a cover promotion for Issue No.8, back when we were still on newsstands… there was a $1000 cash prize for that. We listed that to participate we required professionally shot images and still all those people who felt “what have I got to lose?” sent us dozens of truly unprofessional images. Having to deal with that takes away time we don’t have to answer serious emails we need to. We constantly juggle our time and still can not be as prompt or as thorough as we want to. This entry fee is to keep this contest focused on those who would truly value a Catherine D’Lish robe and we suspect, thank us for doing it this way. In 2019 we randomly gave away of $500 in prizes with contest. Random. No purchase necessary. Over the years we’ve done so to the tune of thousands of dollars. We’ll do that again in the future, follow us for those promotions if this one is not for you.

Q. What if I do a shoot with a friend and we are both in the images, do we both win a robe?
A. No

Q. I have a photoshoot from 5 years ago that fits the contest themes. Can I enter them?
A. As long as they or other images from that session have never been published… YES

Q. I am a photographer, can I submit content on behalf of my models? If one of them wins who gets the robe?
A. Yes as long as they meet our themes, have not been published and are submitted individually. The party submitting the images wins the robe. Provided they have SOLE copyright to them.