Reading List: March 2008
There’s a few mags I’ve been pretty excited about lately and had planned to publish separate posts about but by the time I’d written ‘em, bought a scanner, scanned loads of lush pages in… well, they’d be a bit old really (not that that usually counts for anything… one magazine on this reading list dates back 39 years). So without further ado here’s the Boicozine current reading list for March 2008…
Purple Fashion [purple.fr/fashion]
Purple Fashion is this season’s penultimate fashion magazine :). It’s totally on it in terms of content and imagery and no wonder… former Paris Vogue [vogue.fr] and now Arena Homme+ designers MM Paris [mmparis.com] have been working their magic backstage at the publication for the last few issues to great success. This edition of the weighty tome (442 pages, count em) includes a collection of female fashionable movers and shakers (including fashion directors from Self Service [selfservicemagazine.com] and Paris Vogue) photographed by Terry Richardson, a painted Kelly Osbourne and Karl Lagerfeld’s private pics of Versailles and loads more. It’s pack jammed.
Grafik [grafikmagazine.co.uk]
Okay, so I may have said some unkind things about Grafik in the past. But it’s only because I care. The world would be a greyer place without it. They’ve been churning through the inhouse designers lately too so it’s interesting to try and work out where the mag is heading in terms of it’s design. Looks like Avant Garde is here to stay for a while too. :( I get a mention this month too in the typography section along with the amazing Miss Annie Collinge [anniecollinge.com] with many thanks to Mr Alex Bec [alexbec.com]. Dead chuffed, me.
Creative Review [creativereview.co.uk]
Worth mentioning for it’s long overdue redesign… although, I have to admit, I became more fascinated by the ‘handover issues’ and trying to spot where one designer left and another took over. You could give a bunch of designers the most rigid of briefs and it’s a safe bet there would be subtle differences in each result. So ‘handover issues’ become kind of interesting in this respect. That and I don’t really want to cover the redesign because you can already read all about it in a suitable succinct and intelligent manner on the CR blog [creativereview.co.uk/crblog] and over at MagCulture [magculture.com/blog].
Good Magazine [goodmagazine.com]
When Good magazine issued forth it’s US-centric list of the “best magazines ever” [goodmagazine.com/features], they went from being an interesting new US title to the mortal enemy of non-US maglophiles around the globe. As far as I could tell you couldn’t get the magazine outside of the states anyway so their big mistake was to forget (or wilfully ignore) the fact that when you post on the interweb you are talking to a global audience. Anyway, I’m here to let bygones be bygones because I found my first copy in a London newsagent and it’s fab. It’s the food issue and features information graphics produced by students from the information graphics course at CalArts [calarts.edu]. Smart.
Wired [wired.com]
If contemporary magazine design can be spilt into camps that prescribe to the idea of ‘The New Ugly’ [sad-blog.com] or ‘the Unspectacular’ [boicozine/331], then I’d like to humbly suggest we create a new term for the recent re-invention of Wired magazine. I’m going to call it ‘Maximalism’… I think… does that sound alright? It’s the only way I can describe the carefully plotted, robust, multi layered design they are currently employing. It’s messy yet precise and totally decadent in the use of special colours and the creation of new layouts to different articles. In essence, this is American magazine design at it’s most delirious and showy. It’s bubble gum for your eyes and all the better for it. The last issue bought up the topic of why American magazines have some many annoying subscription notices inside. This latest issue gives you a graph showing the various fluorescent inks Wired have used over the years. Ace.
Vintage House & Garden [houseandgarden.co.uk]
Greenwich ain’t what it used to be. Like Camden, the various quirky little second-hand shops have been edged out by generic high street stores and misguided, developer led ‘improvement schemes’. The Flying Duck [flying-duck.com] closed a couple of weeks ago but not before I could do a sweep and grab a couple of vintage mags including this copy of House & Garden from 1969. I’ll try to post some pics from this mag and a recently aquired copy of Habitat’s catalogue fom 1975, at a later date.
Smoke [smokelondon.co.uk]
More fanzine than magazine, Smoke sets itself apart for the usual ‘full colour cover, black and white inside, typeset by the author’ type publication with the length and breadth of it’s subject matter, ie London in all it’s many shades. Favourite Bus Routes is a highlight… seriously.
How Novel
We’re living in an age of rich cross-media content, were it seems that every image is clickable, every page is searchable, and every thought is commentable. The paperback may seem increasingly obsolete in comparison. However, in terms of content, the humble novel wins the race in my… er, book. During Boicozine’s down time, I gave my mouse finger and ’screen weary’ eyes a break by reading the following novels. It’s great that these can often be uncovered at op/charity shops, for under one unit of your local currency.
The Fountainhead
Jane Austin meets Roland Barthes, in a slightly wacky story of two ‘great’ architects in the early 20th Century [Wikipedia]. Has lofty ideals that you may take or leave. Eerily true to today’s design world, and absolutely unputdownable. If you really can’t leave the screen, there’s a film version [iMDB]. Get a vintage copy online here [www.abebooks.com].
The Guttenberg Revolution
The story of Johan Guttenberg, inventor of the moveable type printing press that lead to all of this. You can see his amazing Bible online here [bl.uk/treasures/gutenberg] and find yourself a copy of the story of The Story here [abebooks.com].
Of course, if you’d prefer to just look at the covers, and let’s face it, as a designer it’s hard not to, there’s always Penguin by Design [penguin.com.au] and Seven Hundred Penguins [penguin.com.au]. Or if you fancy becoming a proper Penguinophile you could delve into any number of the publications produced by The Penguin Collectors’ Society [penguincollectorssociety.org].
Reading List: November 2007
September and October are big months for maglophiles. This year, with recent redesign fever kicking in and a bumper crop of new titles released onto newsstands, it’ s been particularly hard to keep up, let alone decide what a purchase and what’s best left on the shelves. Here’s a brief selection of noteworthy mags from the last couple of months you might want to investigate…
Acne Paper [acnepaper.com]
Not as remedial as it sounds, this is contract publishing at it’s most luxurious. It’s also part of the flood of specialist fashion titles released to coincide with the Autumn/Winter collections. It’s kind of interesting to note that Acne Paper features many clothing labels, other than their own Acne Jeans line [acnejeans.com]. Last issue lead in with several editorial-free colour pages in red, blue and pink. This issue being based on the theme of ‘elegance’ leads in with various shades of grey, complementing the various black and white photography inside.
The Architect’s Journal [architectsjournal.co.uk]
…or ‘AJ‘ as the masthead reads, has had a redesign. The first redesigned issue of which seemed a little lack lustre and possibly a little too safe, so it’s a relief to see the latest issue hitting the nail on the head and making a lot better use of imagery than it’s previous incarnation. I was sad to see design agency, A Practice For Everyday Life (APFEL)’s [apracticeforeverydaylife.com] original redesign go but AJ does feels much more authoritative now and pretty darn stylish for a weekly title.
Grafik [grafikmagazine.co.uk]
Grafik has a new in-house designer, Danny Calvi, whose previous work includes Amsterdam Weekly [amsterdamweekly.nl]. This latest issue is the first time we get to see some of the changes instore for the magazine under it’s compact new design team. How’s it looking? So far, so Dutch and good sign of some subtly quirky typographic choices to come. I, for one, will be hoping for something to replace their fixation with Avant Garde, a typographic joke that’s gotten very, very old.
Lodown [lodownmagazine.com]
Lodown’s experiment in getting different creative types to design each issue continues. Sounds like this one was a bit of hairy one. Apparently, Japanese creatives AANDD [aandd-design.com] ended up turning the whole layout around in just 10 days and there are some dubious inclusions, but worth it to be able catch up with both Fergus Purcell aka Fergadelic and Jethro Haynes [jethrohaynes.com] in the same issue.
Make: Halloween Special [makezine.com]
Make is ace. Remember those weird and geeky magazines form the 50s and 60s like Popular Mechanics [popularmechanics.com] that were chock full of circuit diagrams and funny home projects like making automated catflap doors? Yes? No? Well, anyway Make is like an updated version of these, in a similar format too. The Halloween special includes how to make a robotic jack-o-lantern and a cake that looks like an exploded rib cage. There’s a version of make for girls too called Craft [craftzine.com]. Fun times.
Squint Homme [squintmagazine.com]
A quarterly fashion title from the makers of Squint, a magazine I admit I’ve never bothered with before. This issue is worth a flick for the paper alone. It’s like some lux version of some sort of newsprint stock… or something. Inside there’s a small but perfectly formed selection of articles in German and English followed by, probably a little too much a-typical fashion editorial. Not an essential read but a small enough dosage to prove quite tasty.
‘Sup Magazine [supmag.com]
I love ‘Sup. It’s ace. This issue is jam packed with articles on musical artists and bands with the twist that some of the features are purely photographic. No copy at all. With some lush images of band, Grizzly Bear by photographer Jason Nocito [jasonnocito.com].
The Illustrated Ape [theillustratedape.com]
I admitted to an illustrator friend that I’d never bought a copy of The Illustrated Ape before now and received a look of horror and possibly betrayal. I’ve just never found the editorial as interesting as the imagery and I’m not in the habit of buying picture books (unless they are by Geoff McFetridge [nieves.ch]) so it’s nice to see them dedicating an issue to a very particular theme. You see, this issue is all about Heavenly Records [heavenly100.com] and it’s ace. Tim Fishlock’s [timfishlock.com] art direction is spot on in a not dissimilar way to the excellent Little White Lies [littlewhitelies.co.uk].
Uniqlo Paper No.3 [uniqlo.com/uniqlopaper]
We started with a solid piece of contract publishing for a clothing label calling itself a paper and we’re ending with one too. Uniqlo Paper No.3 continues to outshine the stores’s own Point of Sale with some solid editorial and imagery supplied by creative types such as Jo Ratcliffe [jocandraw.com], Nicola Formichetti fashion editor at Dazed and Confused and Damien Poulain [damienpoulain.com]. And it’s free! And we all know people love free.
Paris Reading List
Having fully blown magazitis means the first thing you have to do when visiting a new city is seek out the city’s finest purveyor of magazines in order to get your fix. I had a few leads in Paris. OFR [ofrpublications.com] has always been a place for mag worship although the quality and regularity of their titles has been somewhat lacking since they decided to focus on vintage clothing. Palais de Tokyo [palaisdetokyo.com] is a great place to visit and has a fab bookstore, they have also started publishing their own magazine which I’ll talk about below. Colette [colette.fr] was pretty darn awesome for mag shopping this time around. I managed to pick up a Japanese version of Tokion, a catalogue of the recent PMKFA [pmkfa.com] exhibition, ‘A Bag of Grease’, as well as a few other gems there too… Here’s a brief run down, ‘mag your way around Paris’ style…
032c [032c.com]
032c comes from one of my fave cities, Berlin, and makes an excellent travelling companion full of fun yet meaty articles for reading inbetween city hopping. With Issue 13, they have taken a new design direction which can only be described as ‘challenging’. Jeremy over at MagCulture discussed it in detail a little while back [magculture.com].
Tokion [tokion.jp]
Relax maybe be long gone now but the Japanese editions of Dazed and Tokion seem to be taking up the slack after it’s departure. Well, to these western eyes anyway. I’ve been itching to see a copy of Tokion since they took the plunge to create a unique version of the Japanese edition and so far it doesn’t disappoint with some snappy typography that enhances the already well established title.
Wallpaper [wallpaper.com]
It’s been all change at a couple of well known British titles this month. The former editor of Wallpaper has moved house to Esquire and given the mag a complete overhaul (it looks great, new size and all, but it wouldn’t have been had to improve upon it’s previous formulaic incarnation). The Editor’s position at Wallpaper has been filled by former creative lead, Tony Chambers. Therefore Wallpaper has a new creative lead and, this issue, a new look. I had to check it out. The new look is worth having a flick through at for sure. Nice choice of type.
Magazine
Wandering about Paris, you think the locals weren’t really bothered about magazines and magazine culture. Sure, there are a handful of decent newsagents (including an ancient-old WH Smiths), specialist mag stores and the newsstands are pretty neat but often few and far between. Then you stumble upon Magazine magazine, a magazine about magazines… natch! It’s a lush publication, which each issue designed by a different ‘cutting edge’ creative team. It’s free too, which is good because it’s also way hard to find. No website and only stocked in a few random stores around town, this mag was like golddust at Colophon2007 earlier this year and for good reason. Read an interview with the editor in the latest edition of Nico [nicomagazine.com].
Technikart / GoGo Paris Guide [gogoparis.com]
GoGo Paris used to be a magazine, then it became a website and then the magazine disappeared, which was a shame because it’s a near indispensable English language guide to all that’s hip to do and see in the capital. French entertainment mag, Technikart [technikart.com] have teamed up with GoGo for a one off guide to Summer in the City. It was like bumping onto an old friend in the street, seeing it back in print again… although they failed to mention that most of Paris shuts down throughout August, we did uncover a number of ace places to go or at least note down for next time.
Palais [palaismagazine.com]
I didn’t get the idea behind Palais magazine when I first saw it but now I’ve been to Palais de Tokyo to see one of the shows it talks about, it all makes sense now. Palais works as a new sort of exhibition catalogue. See the show, buy the mag. It’s kind of ace when you put the two together. It’s also a kind of interesting new avenue for consumer publishing too.
Zero Duex
This is free art mag I picked up at Palais de Tokyo and it’s ace. Everything in it is based around the letter ‘B’ and includes Bee Beards, a co-operative called Bank and their collection of amended press releases, pics of Blown Out windows, Bono singing at Balthus’s funeral and loads more. For an art magazine it’s rather jolly (apart from the funeral bit, obviously).
Reading Matters
Hand Job: A Catalog of Type
The Princeton Architectural Press [papress.com] have been making some interesting publishing choices of late, particularly those of the non-architectural kind. Hand Job is an investigation into hand-drawn typography and recent trends away from mechanical typesetting. If that sounds a bit dry the physical publication is anything but. What you get is a lovingly crafted catalogue of modern day illustrators happy to play with type. The book is curated by Michael Perry [midwestisbest.com], a Brooklyn based designer, and features the work of 55 different designers and illustrators, big and small such as Travis Stearns [iammintcondition.com], Adrian Johnson [adrianjohnson.co.uk], Matilda Tristram [lovelycat.co.uk], Adam Hayes [mrahayes.co.uk] and loads more. You can get your grubby mitts on a copy by visiting [papress.com/handjob] or your friendly neighbourhood design bookshop.
Nico
You may have noticed a shipment of bulky silver ‘book like’ magazines appearing in stores around London town. This is Nico magazine [nicomagazine.com] and is your first stop should you wish to catch up on this year’s Colophon2007 event, held in Luxembourg earlier this year. We’ve already talked about Colophon loads on Boicozine, mainly because we did a spot of ‘live blogging’ [see boicozine/colophon] from Colophon via MagCulture [magculture.com/blog], but this really is the definitive magazine companion to the event. There are interviews with most of the lead speakers by Andrew Losowsky, one of the event curators and it’s published by Mike Koedinger [mikekoedinger.com] whose team pull off the whole thing so seamlessly. That’s just a small part of this lush publication though, there’s loads more to check out and this is only issue one (which I guess means Mr Magazine [mrmagazine.wordpress.com] will be making sure he has his copy).
Bumper Reading List
Jeez. After Colophon, I thought I’d need a break from looking at magazines but it seems to have only fed the addiction. Heaven protect my bank balance. I don’t know how I’m going to get through this lot. Lucky there’s loads of pictures to flick through, I guess. :)
Marios magazine [mariosmagazine.com]
Marios calls itself a magazine but similar to Special [specialmagazine.jp], verges on trendy clothing catalogue for clothing label of the same name. This issue takes the Polish capital, Warsaw as it’s theme and contains some cool photography by Kuba Dabrowski [kubadabrowski.com] and random features on art, fashion, illustration and design. Designed by Two Zero Studio [zerotwo.org], the magazine also utilises a recent trend soon to be emulated by the ‘green’ edition of Creative Review [creativereview.co.uk], of doing away with a cover and leaving the spine exposed, binding and all.
Forum AID [forumaid.com]
I picked this mag up in Copenhagen. It looks like a pharmaceutical packet and offers a type of antidote to your typical architectural magazine by mixing up exterior and interior architecture with furniture and industrial design. Fun but formal would best sums it up, and in english too.
I.D. [idonline.com]
I.D., as opposed to i-D [i-dmagazine.com], the two often get confused, is a magazine I’ve been meaning to add to the NMCA cover archive [nmca.boico.net] for some time now. This issue is particularly good, not just because it features a legendary piece of work by one of my personal design heroes, Lou Dorfsman [typogabor.com/cbs-dorfsman], but because this is the Ornament Issue, with loads of crazy examples of modern ornamental applications including a bunch of suggestions for updating Mies van der Rohe’s Farnsworth House [farnsworthhouse.org].
Neo 2 [neo2.es]
‘Cause it was free at Colophon and this fashion issue is ace. See more of their covers over on the NMCA [nmca/neo2].
Self Service [selfservicemagazine.com]
This mag always feels like a bit of an indulgence, mainly because of the price but it feels even more deluxe now they are publishing it with a hard cover. I almost managed to avoid buying it but realised it’s a Chloé Sevigny special with most of the fashion spreads dedicated to the super stylist come actor.
Time [time.com]
Because of the redesign, really. My bad?
Dummy [dummymag.com]
Dummy just gets bigger. You can now download it, read the blog, join the myspace page, listen to the podcast and loads of other stuff… oh and read the magazine which is designed by i-D art director, Dean Langley, and is a more fun and random take on his work for them. Make sure you check the spine too.
Another Man [anotherman.co.uk]
Bought to you by the bods at Dazed & Confused [dazeddigital.com], this far out shines Dazed, but then it’s a pretty lush and glossy production. Gareth Hague’s [alias.uk.com] typography just gets better and better each issue too. This issue also features full bleed colour pages used to denote stories instead of using titles. Radical.
Lodown [lodownmagazine.com]
It would feel odd visiting Berlin without grabbing a copy of Lodown. This one is alright. I kind of wish Marok [marok.info] was still at the creative helm.
Wired [wired.com]
Cause I’m really liking the redesign. It’s not a bad read really.
Readymade [the-readymade.com]
Pro Qm [pro-qm.de] in Berlin is one of those bookstores you have to seek out when travelling abroad. Their magazine selection has become more architecture orientated since I last visited (I grabbed a copy of A10 [a10.eu]) but I after rummaging through the stuff on the top shelves I found Readymade, a design magazine from Hong Kong. Each issue has a theme, this first edition is the Scandinavian Issue and features loads of really cool interviews.
Reading List: February 2007
Crikey! A book! How did that get in there? Well, I guess at least it’s not a novel or something, although I did try to get through John Wyndham’s Midwich Cuckoos [flickr] after buying a Village of the Damned [iMDB] / Children of the Damned [iMDB] double bill DVD. The Wyndham covers from the 70s are ace. I just don’t have the attention span for novels anymore. Sad, really. So what’s on me shelf?
Identity Kits: A Pictorial Survey of Visual Signals
I bought this from the States off Alibris UK [alibris.co.uk] after visiting the recent Alan Fletcher exhibition [designmuseum.org.uk/alanfletcher]. It was put together by Fletcher and ex-Penguin Creative Director, Germano Facetti [arts.guardian.co.uk] and published in 1971. It was kind of disappointing. I expected loads of corporate identity stuff from the 60s but it’s more esoteric than that. Still a nice thing to have. Kind of bizarre in places.
Entertainment Weekly [ew.com]
I love this mag at the moment. It’s like Smash Hits (takes off hat and bows head) for adults or a slightly smarter version of Heat minus the morbid fascination with people’s weight (actually take that away and there’s not much left of Heat really). One warning though, this is a quintessentially American magazine, dipped and glistening in good ol’ US corn(ball) syrup, so there is the chance EW could leave you feeling a little queasy.
Monocle [monoclemagazine.com]
This mag garnered so much media attention before it hit the shelves (I too waded in to the various discussions but mainly on other people’s websites [magCulture]. Cheeky!) that I don’t think I should mention it any further. So I shant… for now.
Wired [wired.com]
Mark [mark-magazine.com]
I made a promise to myself that I would hold out on buying Mark again for as long as possible after they parted ways with Machine [ourmachine.com] after only 3 glorious issues… but I gave in mainly because there were some lush houses inside this issue. Unfortuntely I hadn’t realised that A10 [a10.eu] seems to have covered most of them already. Dang!
T-Shirt Factory [beamst.com]
Another book?! Well, sort of. It’s more like a compendium. T-Shirt Factory marks the 6 year aniversary of seminal Tokyo T-Shirt emporium, Beams T and features a majorly random selection of design from a wide range of designers and illustrators such as Geoff McFetridge [thedirectorsbureau.com], Work in Progress [workinprogress.com] and Deanne Cheuk [deannecheuk.com]. Not a lot in there to read (and it’s mostly in Japanese) but an excellent, if erratic selection.
Reading List: November 2006
Mmm… nice carpet. Just so you know I don’t just buy loads of Paris Vogue’s here’s me current reading list…
Dummy [dummymag.com]
The Architect’s Journal [architectsjournal.co.uk]
Recently, I’ve been concerned about the rapid redevelopment going on around the City of London as they seem intent of demolishing every last vestige of mid to late 20th Century Architecture. This is where I found out Milton Court was in for the chop. Well worth picking up if you you are concerned about the current state of architecture in Britain, and you should be, especially with the deluge of rash decisions going on in the lead up to the London Olympics.
Little White Lies [littlewhitelies.co.uk]
The Marie Antoinette issue. If you haven’t checked out this mag, it’s worth it just for the concept, and the editor’s don’t necessarily love every film they feature but try to pick the most ‘zeitgiesty’ film at the time the issue comes out. Includes lush pictures of Macarons, see [boico.net/blog/archives/47]
‘Sup Magazine [supmag.com]
Dazed & Confused [dazeddigital.com]
Okay, so I only really bought this for the Sofia Coppola special designed by Peter Miles (there an interesting article about the designer here [International Herald Tribune]). The rest of the magazine is as typically out-of-step and shoddily designed as ever and I kind of wished it hadn’t come in a envelope so I could have seen it first. Nevermind. It came with that rubbish CoolBrands book too which I flicked through and then ‘recycled’.
British Vogue [vogue.co.uk]
I love Vogue. I don’t know why and I’m trying not to buy too many issues because it’s such a rubbish read (have a look at the page on ‘Rave’ in the The List supplement if you fancy a giggle… it’s even got a picture of a Prodigy CD stuck on there), but this is one of those specials I had to own… if only for a month or two.
The Observer Music Monthly [observermusicmonthly.co.uk]
Jarvis Cocker edited this one and I intend to read it from cover to cover so it’s probably going to sit in this pile for a while cause I’m rubbish at reading these days… see, it’s my attention span… I blame the internet :)
i-D [i-dmagazine.com]
I love i-D more. I almost always buy this even if it’s a bit rubbish. I can’t help it.
