Esquire Perfected Conceptual Design Before I Was Born

Back when adobe was still just clay you made houses out of, the art directors at Esquire magazine were perfecting the art of conceptual design with magazine covers that have never been topped.

In 1968 They didn’t have pho­to­shop. They didn’t lay out eight con­cepts in InDe­sign and send the PDFs to the edi­to­r­ial board for approval. They weren’t tri­an­gu­lat­ing their design to work within the para­me­ters of what is hip, what is accept­able, and what will sell. They simply read the sto­ries, and fol­lowed their instincts. Jimmi Hen­drix, stoned out of his mind, did a better national anthem than Celiene Deion hit­ting every note per­fectly. A force of emo­tion always trumps stud­ied cal­cu­la­tion when the goal is an arrest­ing emo­tional response. And that’s what Esquire in the late 60s and early 70s was all about.

Last fall, Esquire posted their cover archive online. Now young folks like myself can relive the magic. I’m famil­iar with a few of the famous iconic covers, but I was shocked to see how good they were every month. A few of my favorites: