Recently in Alternative Weeklies Category

Village Voice Covers

Weekly magazines get a lot of love and attention for their covers, and deservedly so. Time, Bloomberg Businessweek, New York, The New York Times Magazine, until recently, Newsweek, and even the Huffington. app have all been producing a highly sophisticated and oftentimes cutting-edge approach to cover design. Meanwhile, a little under the radar, art director John Dixon has been doing some serious cover rocking over at The Village Voice, creating a graphic, engaging, oftentimes provocative series of weekly covers featuring a powerful array of visual artists. Dixon is using an invigorating mix of photo illustration, photography, and illustration of all kinds, featuring established names like Ward Sutton and Steve Brodner, as well as a stack of vibrant young talent. These days it's rare to see publication design, especially covers, that feels so creatively gonzo, and Dixon manages to pull it off every week with an extremely limited staff and budget. Take a look at this collection of a dozen of our favorite Voice covers from the past couple years.


(Above) The Village Voice, January 9, 2013. Illustration: Edel Rodriguez.
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Weekly Dig/Dig Boston Altweekly Covers

One of my favorite altweekly newspapers is Dig Boston, formerly called (until last year) the Weekly Dig. Creative director Tak Toyoshima's covers are a weekly visual treat using a brilliant selection of illustrators and photographers, and sometimes handling the art chores himself. Dig Boston/Weekly Dig covers are artful, smart, provocative, and funny (and sometimes very funky). Here's a collection of 12 of the best, all designed by Toyoshima, dating from 2007-2012.

(Above): Weekly Dig, August 12, 2009. Illustration: Matt Moore
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The Top Alternative Newsweekly Covers of 2011: 10 Runner-Ups

Earlier this week we published The Top 10 Alternative Newsweekly Covers of 2011. There were so many good covers that we decided to add this list of 10 runner-ups. Here, in no particular order, is another batch of amazingly creative covers from across the country… MORE

The Top 10 Alternative Newsweekly Covers of 2011

2011 was another great year for alternative newsweekly cover design. Papers big and small across the country put out a steady stream of covers that were by turns graphic, provocative, funny, and highly original. With the rise of publication cover sites like Coverjunkie and NASCAPAS (and SPD Grids!) these local and regional covers are now reaching an audience around the globe. Altweekly covers are produced fast and cheap, oftentimes by what are basically one-person shops, and they're filled with passion and creativity and a sense of gonzo design. Here's our list of The Top 10 Alternative Newsweekly Covers of 2011. There were so many good ones that we're going to have a list of 10 runner-ups later this week.

1. The Stranger, January 13, 2011 (Above). Published immediately following the shooting of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. Art director: Aaron Huffman.
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Altweekly Cover Design Awards

The annual altweekly awards were announced on July 22 at the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies annual conference in New Orleans. In addition to awards for best cover design in two categories (large and small circulation), awards were also given for best editoral layout, illustration, and photography.

Top awards for cover design went to Riverfront Times and art director Tom Carlson (large circulation), and to Seven Days and art director Diane Sullivan (small circulation). You can see all the cover award winners here and on the jump page.

(Above): Large circulation (over 50,000): First place. Riverfront Times, art director: Tom Carlson.
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The Covers of the SF Weekly

Andrew Nilsen has been the art director of alternative newsweekly SF Weekly since January 2010. One of his SF Weekly covers won a gold medal at this year's SPD Gala for Best Illustrated Cover, with an illustration by Brian Stauffer. A lot of his covers are self-illustrated (he says about 40%), and like art directors at other altweeklies, he operates with little time, staff, or budget. Yet he's managed to produce an impressive body of work, corralling illustrators like Stauffer, Scott Bakal, and Luba Lukova to produce memorable imagery and powerful covers.

Here are 10 of our favorite SF Weekly covers.

See a full collection of Nilsen's SF Weekly covers here.

(Above): SPD Gold Medal Winner for Best Illustrated Cover: June 9, 2010. Illustration by Brian Stauffer.
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More Alternative Weekly Covers from 2010

This is the third and final collection of our 2010 Alternative Newsweekly Covers round-up. Here are 10 more fun, cool, original covers. And half of them were illustrated by the art directors themselves.… MORE

The Top Alternative Newsweekly Covers of 2010: 10 Runner-Ups

Earlier this week we published our list of the Top 10 Alternative Newsweekly Covers of 2010. There were so many good covers from 2010, though, that we decided to add this list of 10 runner-ups. Here's another batch of relentlessly creative, original, and provocative cover designs from across the country (listed in alphabetical order).
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The Top 10 Alternative Newsweekly Covers of 2010

2010 was a banner year for alternative newsweekly cover design. SPD has showcased a lot of these covers during the year in our Cover of the Day feature and elsewhere on the site. These papers are free, so they're not burdened with the need to sell copies on the newsstand, which lets the art directors produce bold, original, provocative covers that connect instantly with readers (and also are perfect for getting passed around a lot on the internet). These covers are produced for the most part quickly and cheaply; three of the covers here were illustrated by the art directors themselves. Here's our list of the Top 10 Alternative Newsweekly Covers of 2010. Stay tuned later in the week for our list of the 10 runner-ups.
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Las Vegas Weekly Covers: Cool Altweekly Design from Sin City

Benjamen Purvis was the art director of alternative weekly Las Vegas Weekly from 2002-08. Confronted with a weekly cover budget averaging $250 and an extremely short production cycle, Purvis ended up doing a lot of the photography and illustration himself. He estimates that he photographed or illustrated over 225 covers during his stint at the Weekly. According to Purvis, "Covers were put together on the fly. I'd usually have two business days to execute them, and rarely got cover lines more than a few hours before the cover was due at the printer."

Las Vegas has three alt-weeklies, and its own unique culture. "I tried to do everything I could to make my covers stand out," says Purvis. "It was my hope to embrace regionalism, and mirror the spirit and history and mythology of Vegas whenever I could. There's more sin and skin on these covers than you'll see on a typical alt-weekly. We were trying to capture the 'what happens here, stays here' culture of Las Vegas, in as playful a way possible."

Purvis was laid off from the Weekly in October 2008 during a companywide downsizing. He's now the art director at Seattle Met, a monthly city magazine. We've collected some of his more memorable Las Vegas Weekly covers, along with some comments on how they were put together. Most of these covers were completely conceived, photographed, designed, and retouched by Purvis.

(Above): CineVegas 2003, June 12, 2003. Photograph by Benjamen Purvis.


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The Village Voice Queer Issue Cover

The Village Voice continues their recent run of provocative and memorable covers with this week's Queer Issue. On the cover are three guys (Ronnie, Mike, and Vinny) from MTV's Jersey Shore reality show. The headline: "The Guido Ideal: MTV's surprise hit accents the real situation: Jersey's shore on the down-low." Art director: John Dixon.

A Redesign for Atlanta Altweekly Creative Loafing

Newspaper designer/art director Ron Reason has a smart new post on his website about his recent redesign of Atlanta alternative weekly Creative Loafing. The redesign was conceptualized in a week-long "redesign boot camp" that Reason organized with the paper's staff. There's a lot of good behind-the-scenes information, plus some creative approaches to organizing and naming departments and sections. And there are some thoughtful new ways of integrating ads into the edit, an acknowledgement that these days art directors need to pay as much attention to commerce as they do art. 

Village Voice fold-in cover

This week's Village Voice cover is a take on the classic Al Jaffee fold-in back covers for Mad magazine. Only this one is on the front cover, probably the first time this has ever been done. Art director John Dixon and illustrator Jason Edmiston have combined to create a striking and totally brilliant cover. Fold in the cover, and you get the answer to the question "A Bullish Market Is Producing Dreams of a Coney Island That's Exciting and Not a Real Dozer." You're going to have to pick up a copy of the Voice (it's free) to find out what's revealed when the cover is folded.

Maui Wowie

MauiTime is an alternative weekly newspaper based on the island of Maui, Hawaii. Art director Chris Skiles has been there since August 2009. He worked at an ad agency in Houston before taking over the art direction duties at MauiTime. His covers are bright, bold, passionate, provocative, and engaging, heavily influenced by poster design, and done on a shoestring budget (according to Skiles, about $20 an issue, on average). Skiles creates most of the cover images, either with stock photos and illustration, or by doing the illos himself. Here are 10 of the coolest MauiTime covers. … MORE

The Village Voice covers of Ivylise Simones

Ivylise Simones was the art director of The Village Voice from January 2008-January 2010. She did over 100 covers in that time, many of them self-illustrated (Simones estimates that she created a third of the covers herself). The low budgets, quick production schedule, and Simones's own street smart design style helped to create a look that was brash, graphic, funny, provocative, and immediate. She used bold photography and strong original illustration to give the covers a unique sense of power and imagination. Here are 11 of the best Ivylise Simones covers from The Village Voice. … MORE

San Antonio Current

The San Antonio Current is another alternative weekly newspaper featuring remarkable cover design and imagery created on a shoestring budget. Chuck Kerr is the talented graphic designer/illustrator/poster maker (and band drummer!) who has art directed the Current for the past four years. Kerr's cover designs, many of them featuring his own illustration and photo illustration talents, are graphic, playful, engaging, and very smart. The above Tex-Mex salute to Andy Warhol's Velvet Underground & Nico LP cover, which Kerr describes as "a fitting tribute to San Antonio's vastly underrated local music scene," is just one example of the intelligence and graphic power of the Current's cover design.… MORE

Great illustrated covers from the Santa Fe Reporter

The Santa Fe Reporter is an alternative newsweekly in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The cover designer is Angela Moore, who has been working there since 2003. Formerly the art director, she now works from home doing just the Reporter covers. An editorial illustrator who lived and worked in New York, she draws on that experience to hire great illustrators for the paper's covers. The Reporter has an editorial budget for an entire issue that is less than what most national magazines pay for a spot illustration, and to stay on budget Moore has to create at least one free cover a month. Still, she has managed to turn the Santa Fe Reporter into one of the best venues for illustration in the country, a publication filled with creative and imaginative imagery. … MORE

The creative power of Miami New Times

The knockout cover pictured above is the work of Pam Shavalier, the very talented art director of alternative weekly Miami New Times. In two years at the paper, Shavalier has crafted a brilliant, creative, highly-original set of covers, creating a look that is as much the voice of Miami New Times as its editorial pages. In her spare time, she designs the covers and serves as art director for the paper's sister publication, New Times Broward-Palm Beach. … MORE

Smart alternative weekly covers from Westword

Denver-based Westword is another alternative weekly newspaper producing brilliant and original cover design. … MORE

The smart cover design of Riverfront Times

Riverfront Times is an alternative weekly newspaper based in St. Louis, owned by the Viilage Voice Media chain of newspapers. Tom Carlson has been the senior art director at the paper since 1988. He does a lot of smart, cool work. … MORE