One Beast of a Redesign

By David Topping

In 2005, Maclean’s—the Canadian newsmagazine—got a redesign. In 2007, Time—the American newsmagazine—got one, too. And Maclean’s, in an editor’s note at the time, pretended to not be pissed off at their American competitor but obviously were, suggesting that Time had swiped all their good new ideas, like “more text, smaller pictures and headlines….black, white, red, yellow type…[and] boxes at the top of the cover with headlines and pictures.”
So, now, this: Maclean’s just unveiled a new layout for their website, and it looks awfully—and unmistakably—similar to the layout for Tina Brown’s big-deal Daily Beast, which has been around with its current look for a good six months now. We’ll leave you to explore the similarities yourself, but you may find that there’s a whole lot more in common than font colours.