Customer Reviews

magCulture: New Magazine Design

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This attractive book falls firmly into the category of what I call "designer porn". Like any number of design books that look to provide an overview of the latest wave in whatever field, it's both mouthwatering and entirely impractical. The six essays that open the book do a decent job of setting the context for what follows and providing an overview of consumer magazines, newspaper magazines, indie mags (mircrozines), corporate/brand magazines, and even web magazines, but the real-world designer is unlikely to find any helpful tips or advice (granted, the book isn't intended to do that to begin with). The 150 or so pages that follow are chockablock with beautifully shot examples of the latest and greatest magazine design from the late '90s and early '00s (almost all the examples are from Western Europe). Organized into sections on overall format, cover design, flow, typography, and photography, these make for great eye candy, and act as a sort of sourcebook for potential inspiration, but that's about it. Overall, it's a nice book, but almost all the examples are of magazines supported by fancy ads or fancy corporations. What would be nice is if someone could put together a similar book based on low-budget magazines. That's something that would transcend the usual designer porn and actually be useful to more of us.

I am a magazine designer always on the lookout for new books addressing the topic. This one was...just ok. Most of the showcase designs are too abstract to really apply in most small publication markets. Not a total waste, but there are far better books on the topic (such as "Suprise Me" or "Magazine Design That Works")

The title said enough of it. Buy the book and you can learn lot more about editorial design and editorial part. Good luck!