In her personal column, which from now on will be published to coincide with each new magazine release, our design director Barbara Iwanicka takes you behind the scenes of FRAME’s production. This time, she talks us through the creative choices made for our Spring edition.

At the start of this year, FRAME magazine got a new editorial structure. We saw it as a great opportunity to refresh some elements of the design. Focusing on one theme per issue, the magazine provides a deep dive into a specific topic and offers readers valuable insights, knowledge and inspiration. Keeping a visual familiarity while making the design speak to the theme was a delicate balance. 

We wanted to create a cohesive visual narrative with unique elements. The best way to do it, we found, was to add an extra typeface that would reflect the theme. The decision to use Lÿno by Karl Nawrot and Radim Peško for big typographical gestures was based on its rejection of a definitive form, and the way it creates a sense of movement and change, despite being used for a static medium like print. Our team fell in love with Lÿno’s fluctuating forms, so we started looking for more opportunities to use it in the magazine. After inserting it in titles, subtitles and highlights, we moved on to large page numbers, which add a new layer to the navigation and make the reading experience more fun. 

Our other goal was to make the magazine more approachable, so we enlarged the body text for more accessible content and allowed flexible image placement for distinctive visual connections.

Overall, the design of this issue aims to create a sense of pliability and evolution, despite the constraints of print. Hope you enjoy reading it as much as we enjoyed making it!

Get your copy of FRAME 151 here.