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Case Study | TVGuide

What we did: TheHighlights pages hadtraditionally had a“rolling log” design,simply column aftercolumn of entries. We remade these in amagazine format, withsingle page features(right) interrupting thelistings, allowing for astronger editorial voicethroughout.

The Problem: When TV Guidewas looking to redesign, the editors weren’t concerned abouttheir logo, photography, or anyglamourous stuff. The problemwas that cable channels weremultiplying, and their trademarksmall pages were quickly begin-ning to resemble Sanskrit. They couldn’t make the book anylarger, because of their custom grocery store checkoutboxes. So the grids had to bereworked, as did the “highlights”listings which ran alongside.

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mario garcia

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What we did: Above, even single pages were interrupted by boxes, forcontrast and a stronger editorial voice.

What we did: For the grids (right), we did type tests, deciding on ahighly readable Interstate Condensed. Leading and tracking wereadjusted to fit as much text as possible, while retaining legibility. Next,we looked at the page to see if there was unnecessary information tak-ing up space. We minimized page headers and dropped folios (wouldyou really use page numbers?). One important piece of information,the day header, was left large. But the real breakthrough was removing the vertical rules in each grid. While traditional, they areoften unnecessary, since the content defines the verticals. This contributed white space, making the pages much more readable.

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