Hasta La Ideas

Next into the fold of folded magazines? STEP inside design and Dynamic Graphics+Create. WebMediaBrands, the parent company of mediabistro.com (the ones who keep us tethered to our Egg chairs here at UnBeige HQ), has closed the two bimonthly design magazines and eliminated eight of nine positions associated with the titles, which each had circulations of 20,000 to 25,000. “We are putting greater emphasis on the Web and we felt now was the time to move these titles exclusively online,” WebMediaBrands CEO Alan Meckler told our sister blog MediaJobsDaily.

Our prescription for coping with the loss of STEP inside design and Dynamic Graphics in tangible form? Denial, of course. And a rollicking interview with designer Chip Kidd, who talked with Sean Adams in STEP‘s March/April issue. Among the revelations are those of the sartorial variety. “The clothes that interest me, for myself, are what I would call Classic But Interesting, which means there has to be some sort of color involved,” said Kidd. “But I also buy very much for the long term, so whatever it is, it has to be wearable five years from now, ten years, twenty, etc. It should be noted that I try to apply this rule to my book jackets as well.”

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Craving a special 60th anniversary edition Artek stool? In want of a Comme des Garçons-approved fragrance inspired by Japanese hot-spring baths and Scandinavian forests? On the hunt for a Valextra notebook swathed in buttery, mustard-hued leather? Get thee to Los Angeles, where Tyler Brûlé‘s Monocle (“a global briefing covering international affairs, business, culture, and design”) today opened its second retail outpost. Like the magazine’s first shop, which debuted last year in London’s Marylebone, the stateside Monocle Shop is wee—a mere 115 square feet worth of the the Brentwood County Mart—but ambitious, stocking everything from limited-edition collaboration products such as smart-sized travel bags to the full complement of Monocle backissues. Where will a Monocle Shop pop up next? We hear that Tokyo is at the top of Brûlé’s wish list. Perhaps he’ll seek inspiration from Tokyo’s Tokyo, Yoshitaka Haba‘s new “editorial” airport gift shop that is featured in the April issue of Monocle.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media

If you’re a regular reader of The Architect’s Newspaper, like we are, and happen to live in Chicago, where one half of us does, you’ll be excited to hear that the paper has decided to possibly reverse its decision to not start a separate Chicago-focused edition here, something they’d decided last year when the economy went south. While they haven’t made any big moves yet, just plans to release something of a “test issue” in June that’s Windy City-centric, it certainly does give one more strength within those crossed fingers. Here’s a bit of analysis from Blair Kamin:

The more voices Chicago has monitoring and analyzing its vast, energetic, ever-contentious architecture scene, the better. The Architect’s Newspaper already has Northeast and California editions, which provide a sophisticated mix of news, criticism, commentary and gossip. With Chicago’s wealth of architectural activity and absence of a critical design journal, the city seems to be a natural for this publication, whose Northeast edition comes out two or three times a month.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media

Speaking of magazine design, as much money and time that Complex spent on their latest cover has nothing on the newest issue of the Swedish magazine Tare Lugnt who put together a Stefan Sagmeister AIGA poster-esque piece of work, designing and printing their whole third issue on human skin via tattoos (found thanks to the good people at PSFK). Granted, it wasn’t a tome like the fall issue of Vogue or anything, coming in at just three pages, all readable on their site, if you speak Swedish — and you really should learn, since they went to so much trouble to publish it (there’s also a video about the process therein). Though if you do speak the language and you do wind up reading each of the pieces, we ask you, for the sake of these editors, clearly the toughest in the industry, to please, please ignore any typos you might find. That’s hard enough to hear about after something goes to print. Has to be extra difficult when you have to walk around with it on you for the rest of your life.

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We’ll admit to having found the April issue of Glamour, in which actress Hayden Panettiere is for some reason dressed as Amelia Earhart, rather befuddling, until we hit page 261, which is given over to the unmistakably fantastic work of artist Marilyn Minter. As part of the magazine’s 70th anniversary celebration (that’s the April 1939 cover, at left), Glamour photo editor Suzanne Donaldson invited ten top female artists to define glamour. The artists—Minter, Nina Chanel Abney, Rita Ackermann, Sarah Charlesworth, Tracey Emin, Rachel Feinstein, Laurie Simmons, Lorna Simpson, Mickalene Thomas, and Kara Walker—responded with everything from a wall of framed found photo-booth portraits and ink drawings (Simpson) to an eerie six-foot tall resin sculpture based on the Commedia dell’arte character of Punch, en famille (Feinstein).

“I got a broad range of responses, from gorgeous to disturbing,” notes Donaldson. “We are so used to being enticed by photographs in magazines, but this art doesn’t offer easy answers; it pokes the reader and poses the challenge: What is glamour to you?” Click “continued…” to see a few of the works from “The Glamour Project,” which is on view through March 21 at Lehmann Maupin Gallery in New York City as well in the pages of Glamour.

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New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media