Like most graphic design, magazine design is an exercise in combining technical detail with artistic flair. The core components of editorial design are text and pictures, so a keen understanding of typography, layouts, grids and composition is essential. Magazines perhaps more than any other format show how the many elements of graphic design can come together in one place: images, illustration, photography, logos and mastheads, information design, paper stock and so on. What is perhaps a little different from other areas of graphic design is that editorial design demands constant reinvention, as Jeremy Leslie of magculture.com explains: “Editorial design uses and fuses two key elements of graphic design. It uses templates and sets up rules to follow, which is the technical side, in terms of understanding structure and limiting your choices to make certain statements. But it’s also about taking the rules that you have set up and making something creative from them. Unlike most areas of graphic design, editorial design is an ongoing project. It’s not a one-off, like a piece of packaging or a poster, where you get it all set up and then hit the print button; it needs to develop. Graphic designers need to come up with a strong functional basis and rules, but you’re also looking to bend those rules on a daily, weekly or monthly basis. There has to be a balance between the familiar, so people recognise the magazine they bought last time,
and surprise, to let them know it’s a new issue.”
Creative Review: Launched in 1980, Creative Review inspires, informs and stimulates debate across the fields of advertising, design and visual culture worldwide. They aim to produce thought-provoking content covering graphic design, advertising, digital media, illustration, photography, typography and essentially, any other form of visual communication.
Are they a Magazine/ Twitter Feed/ iPad App/ Blog?
Creative Review is all of the above (and a bit more). Originally a monthly magazine, print is at the heart of CR's history and they still curate exclusive content and produce the perfect bound, high quality magazine (on the best quality paper) each month. You can subscribe or buy single and back issues on their online shop. CreativeReview.co.uk plays home to the much loved CR Blog, where you can find inspiration from current projects chosen and critiqued by CR editorial staff alongside Feed, their showcase section which allows registered users of the site to upload their work.
Develop and execute a 20 page magazine layout for Creative Review:
• The 20 Page magazine includes a cover design all of which is self-generated content (except article copy) & imagery in line with the Creative Review demographic and based on the same grid system and typographic treatment.
• I had to use my own images/photos and illustrations to create a design layout that suit the article copy. Use all of the copy provided for each article and generate appropriate imagery on the topic.
