RECENT PROJECTS ON AR+
Mar 12
Here’s the new logo for the Architectural Review, which will be on the front cover of next month’s issue! We’re very excited. This is the first time the magazine has been comprehensively redesigned for around 20 years.
In fact, the magazine doesn’t really have a tradition of grand redesigns, with previous art directors adding things as they went along for most of the history of the magazine. Probably the best-known art director in the magazine’s history was Bill Slack (who worked here between 1960 and 1990) and he was behing the incredible eclecticism of the magazine for most of that period. That ended with the current design, which has more or less stayed the same since it was brought it.
When I was writing the brief, I was very aware of and inspired by his work, and spent a lot of time in the archive, looking and learning from ARs past.
Original logo used in the 60's, 70's and 80's
We particularly loved this logo, and decided to appropriate it, redraw it and make a 21st century version. In fact, a lot of the display copy in the magazine has been inspired by the historic typography of the AR. It is great to discover that it’s not all Swiss-designed sans serifs, but includes all manner of different and decorative typefaces.
Our redesign is by Violetta Boxill of London-based graphic design consultancy Alexander Boxill, working with the AR’s art director Cecilia Lindgren. I worked together with them on Icon magazine between 2003 and 2006 and Violetta also design my recent book (Hatch, published in 2008 by Laurence King), so we have a great collaborative relationship. Violetta was also getting more and more pregnant as the process progressed, so we’re grateful for her undying commitment!
I’ll write more about the redesign, and reveal a few more details, in upcoming posts.
Click on sketches to enlarge. Escape to exit.
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