Openness, applied in scholarly and research practices, has garnered increasing interest in recent years. With the broadening reach of Open Access as an alternative scholarly publishing model, there is anticipation that open scholarship practices will produce desirable outcomes for research and access to knowledge. The purpose of this article is twofold: firstly to highlight that Open Access is more than just the removal of paywalls, and that it is part of a wider set of open practices that can potentially yield a more collaborative and equitable global landscape of knowledge production. Secondly, to present the IDS Bulletin as a case study for an Open Access publication that has evolved to adapt to a changing scholarly publishing landscape. By critiquing prevalent discourse on openness alongside this case study, we hope that this article contributes to conversations on issues at the intersection of open scholarship, collaborative research and equitable access to knowledge.