I was at my fiancée's parents' place last weekend, and they had something very interesting sitting on their coffee table. In very good condition, it was the 10 year anniversary edition of Rolling Stone. Rolling Stone magazine was started in 1967, which meant that the magazine I was looking at was printed in 1977 - 32 years ago for those of you keeping count.
I figured I'd have a look and see what layout trends I could pick up from it. I hadn't jumped that far back in a design-intensive mainstream publication before without being guided to it. Yes, I have seen examples of design from other eras, I have seen old National Geographics, old newspapers, et cetera, but the nature of advertisements in some of those publications just didn't resonate with me the way the ones in this Rolling Stone magazine did. There were ads for cars, ads for Technics turntables, and there was an ad for the new Queen album that had just come out. Earlier in the day I saw a poster in downtown Victoria for a Queen tribute band that was coming to town. I felt like I was in a time machine.
I can see how these ads would have had an effect on me in the time they were printed, and they still do now. Advertisement with copy-writing that had sniper-like precision, extremely deliberate art direction with great photography, hand-drawn art that was custom made for the ads, and methodical, grid-driven typography that looked absolutely beautiful. As impressive as these things were, it was equally refreshing to realize what wasn't there - name any of the overused effects you don't like in any technology or graphic design program these days. Everything was so clean, so focused on communicating the message through visuals and the written word, and it worked so well. I thought to myself - what can we, as graphic designers, take away from this?
To me, as much as graphic design is about making things look great and compelling, it's also a matter of furthering visual communication. Looking at this archive of design and layout reinforced the idea that great layout does not mean a lot of graphics, brushes, vectors or otherwise - it's about the concept and what needs to be said. Everything else needs to get out of the way - either something is going to enhance or it is going to obfuscate. It's as simple as that. It's something I take with me to website design, print design and, more recently, interface design.
Inside the magazine, there was also a great spread of some of Annie Leibovitz's photographic work from the previous 10 years of the magazine which was visually stunning. There were some really candid stories about photo shoots that she did with presidents, rock stars - you name it. It is worth a look as well if you come across this particular issue.
The photo that accompanies this post was one I snapped a couple weeks ago on Pandora Avenue in Victoria. I posted another photo of the street art one on my blog. People seem to like to get down on the street and design things. It's really street level art. I don't know what it means - or if it needs to mean anything, but it is nice to look at, and it's not getting in the way of any message. No one took credit for this or the other piece.
Have you come across any surprise design inspirations lately? What were they, and what made it compelling for you?
thank you
thanks.