Jenny Grigg and the art of Meanjin

Nadiah Abdulrahim September 23

You’ve got the new issue of Meanjin in your hands. It looks a bit different, It’s a bit bigger, has an embossed cover, and a gallery of full-colour photographs inside. Although it is the second issue under Sally Heath and Zora Sanders’ editorial helm, it feels like it’s their first. Spring is an appropriate time to launch a new design. I spoke to Jenny Grigg, the designer, about the new Meanjin look.

First things first — Jenny’s name has been mentioned a few times on this blog (and rightly so, as she’s been a very busy lady, redesigning the magazine and website), but there hasn’t been a formal introduction. If her name doesn’t immediately ring any bells, you might recognise some of her work. Jenny has worked on some impressive projects, ranging from those beautiful UQP Peter Carey covers to Random House’s Australian Vintage Classic series. She also provided the cover illustration for Meanjin’s Autumn 2011 issue.

June 2011 artwork by Jenny Grigg

For the redesign, Jenny worked closely with Sally and Zora, tossing ideas back and forth through lengthy phone calls and meetings. ‘Sally and Zora briefed me on the key points of this new direction, and we talked about it all the way through the development stages’, Jenny says. The brief provided by the editors was ‘very open’, and the final product is a result of collaboration.

The new design is a nod to Meanjin’s long history as one of Australia’s foremost literary publications. Jenny’s first point of reference was the Meanjin archive at the MUP office. Meanjin has had an impressive number of collaborations with respected designers in its illustrious past; designers such as Eric Thake, Douglas Annand and Arthur Boyd have contributed cover art.

Meanjin cover from 1950 by Eric Thake

With such an inspired history to work from, Jenny set out to design a publication that would emphasise the quality of work published in its pages. ‘Essentially, it is a design that goes unnoticed, guided by the theory that the selected content is what should stand out. With this design approach, articles are easy to read and images are able to sit in their own space’. The typeface, Tiempos, was chosen for its ‘fairly mellow, easy to read and friendly style’, as it allows the content in the journal to stand out.

Drawing from her book design experience, Jenny merged ‘the clear, simple attributes of book design into the magazine-style publication’. And although Meanjin does resemble a book in appearance — now more so than ever, with its flaps and embossed cover — it is edited like a magazine.

Of course, it’s not just the print publication that has a new look. The website has also been redesigned in tandem with the print edition. Along with Sally and Zora, Jenny has been working closely with Virginia Murdoch of Inventive Labs on the website. Part of Meanjin’s new focus is the online and digital aspect of the journal. As more of the journal’s content becomes available online, Jenny tells me that it was an important part of the redesign brief that the journal and website to reflect and correspond with each other. The design works well in its online incarnation, and Jenny and Virginia’s efforts to ensure Meanjin’s visual identity is recognisable in both mediums has succeeded.

But it’s not over for Jenny, even now that both the website and the Spring issue have been launched. ‘A redesign proves itself in the reinterpretations with each issue’, she says, and she’s been busy working on the Summer issue. Jenny is looking forward to seeing a set of the journals with her handiwork together – ‘each with its own quirks, but clearly part of the same era, in Meanjin’s long, amazing history’.

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