Iconography

This is a fairly short review, and it’s entirely my fault.

I’d been saving writing about the relaunch of Icon magazine (not to be mistaken with the bling sleb magazine set up and run by ex-footballers). And then I’d been putting it off. And then I got distracted and oh look a badger.

Now I see that they’re four issues into the redesign, and I’m somewhat out of date. It’s not easily obtainable on the American newsstands I frequent, so I shall make some sweeping statements about the redesign issue, the magazine in general, and otherwise mark it down as “worth a look” for those who don’t know it.

The salient points:

• It’s an architecture/design mag that treads that difficult line between thinking about current projects, and thinking about thinking about current projects.

• That means it puts thought about the way of things alongside things. So “the light bulb” sits next to new architecture, art in public spaces alongside designer furniture.

• That could make it unbearably clever-clever, but mostly it isn’t. Well-chosen images and a design that breathes in the space its given, helps a lot. Texts are either short and newsy or “isn’t it funny when you think about it”, or long essays allowing room for thought without being over-designed.

• Like Wallpaper and Esquire UK before them, they have rather lovely subscriber-only, cover-line free covers. The above image is the subscriber copy. Here’s the newsstand one, though I’m not sure it works better than the line-less one. Is Bless really a big enough name to make people pick up the mag? There’s also a bit of confusion between the big pink caps and the lower case. Which is the sell? Is it the CAPS (“SOU FUJIMOTO”) or is it the lower case (“Markus Miesson meets Olafur Eliasson”)? If the caps, do ESSAY, CONVERSATION really do the job? If the lower case, does “Sand, stone and styrene”? Will the extra clutter actually result in more sales?

There are many other design / architecture magazines around, and unlike many, this one doesn’t scream “buy me” for its trendy exclusives and launch party photos. Instead, it’s more like Radio 4 for architects and industrial designers – thoughtful, occasionally too thoughtful for its own good, but also calmly interesting, sardonic and quietly provocative for its dedicated fan base. At its best moments, it rewards the time you give it, which is more often than not – a ratio to be proud of.

For a more indepth, and far more timely review, I point the honorable reader to Simon Esterson on the Eye blog back in September, where there are more images of the mag too.

I hereby promise to do better for the next review, which will be of a strange and both wonderful and morally dubious beast.