BACKGROUND
Alethia is a (fictional) new and upcoming Canadian editorial magazine that will publish monthly issues covering a wide range of topics.
The name Alethia is inspired by the Greek philosophical concept of truth and the revealing of truth. Additionally, the alternative spelling, Aletheia, refers to the Greek goddess of truth, further reinforcing the magazine's focus on uncovering and presenting true and authentic information.
PROCESS
IDEA AND CONCEPT BUILDING:
Using the word "Alethia" as my guide, I focused my design and layouts on the concept of truth. To visually represent this abstract concept, I decided that truth is best presented as something simple, unembellished, and direct. As a result, I chose a clean, timeless, and straightforward layout for the magazine.
RATIONALE:
As a new publication, a strong cover is essential for Alethia to compete on a crowded magazine stand. To ensure it grabs a viewer's attention and not obscured, I intentionally gave the masthead the highest visual hierarchy and positioned it at the very top of the layout. The rest of the cover design is minimal and clean, reinforcing the magazine's theme of truth with a simple, direct aesthetic.
To demonstrate the versatility of the layout, a second and third issue covers were designed to show how different hero images and shorter article titles would work within the existing layout. The hero image always reflects the main feature article of the magazine, providing a visual snapshot of the article's content to attract attention and interest of the reader. The main focus of the image is centered to prevent visual imbalance and to avoid conflict with the text.
In addition to the magazine covers, I also designed several sample spreads for the internal content pages.
