Thursday, May 30, 2013

New Times magazine / selected pages

New Times was a bi-weekly news oriented magazine started by George Hirsch.  The first issue was in October 1972.  Hirsch's idea was not to compete with the established news weeklies like Time, Newsweek, US News & World Report or against Atlantic, Foreign Report and other serious monthlies.  
     A bi-weekly might just catch on but like most other consumer magazines it depended on adverting to cover costs and New Times never did convince Madison Avenue that it had the right readers.  The last issue was January 8, 1979 and the cover was flashed as the Farewell issue with the theme of Decadence running through most of the pages.  Steve Phillips was the Design Director for the magazine and I thought he did some really creative pages as you can see from the examples below.

Contents pages are always a good indicator of how well designed a magazine is.

Some of the early issues had some bautifully designed department spreads.




























Monday, May 27, 2013

Sardine tin labels

I've had some feedback from regular visitors to PP and they say they like the unpredictability of what they might find each time they visit.  It's all printed matter but the widest possible range of material and this latest post is no exception: sardine tin labels!  
     Someone gave me this sixteen page book and with it came thirty unused labels.  Like most everyday labels individually these look rather boring, none of them are designed in the usual sense of the word but like matchbook covers, beer mats, cigarette packs or orange crate labels when you get a lot together they take on a visual fascination.  
     The Norwegian sardine canning industry was centered around Stavanger and page eleven of the book suggests that the number of different label designs was between 10,000 and 15,000!  I wonder if  pilchard tin labels would generate the same sort of interest?


















Monday, May 20, 2013

Illustrations from past decades / part 12 / Beer belongs / three

The first twenty paintings in this Beer belongs ad campaign are in the December 2012 Archive.  Then twenty each in February 2013 and September 2013.











This painting was used three times: 1947, 1950 and 1951, each time in November.