Did you pick up this week’s paper? Did you feel refreshed and a wee bit giddy after flipping through it?
We thought you might. That’s because of two things: the Mercury now comes out on Wednesday, and our editorial pages got a redesign. Other than that the paper is pretty much full of the same old delicious shit you love, and if you don’t care about designery redesign stuff, stop reading now.
If you do care even the tiniest little bit, read more after the jump.
You might be wondering why we redesigned? Well, The editorial pages were originally designed for reading in dark 1990’s grunge bars and we’ve been using the same template for the past 12 years. It’s a handy template and has trusty fonts that punch the eye like a champ (our old headline fonts went by the name of Champion).
But as useful as the Mercury‘s template has been, it’s also been a little useless. Ever try to find a section or column in the paper and just end up fruitlessly flipping pages in both directions? Well, now we have a navigation bar at the top of every page, so you’ll know where to find what you’re looking for.
Another thing we fixed was our info boxes. As square boxes they’ve bullied the flow and spacing of stories around for years. Now the info boxes are round and the stories flow around them like melted velvet tiger jizz.
You’ll also notice our columnists have been rendered in monumental illustrations by Ryan Alexander-Tanner. Why did we do this? Sarah Mirk thought it would be a good idea. So if you don’t like it, talk to her.
There’s a bunch of other tiny things that got a facelift too, but it’s boring and I don’t want to talk about it.
Here are a couple sample pages for those of you who can’t afford to pick up a free hard copy of the paper:
Now it’s your turn to do something nice for us.
Looks nice. I like the illos, and the navigaish up top.
p.s. do you miss Hawaii?
That looks pretty sharp, and the new issue’s cover is gorgeous.
Love the new look and illustrations, and ten points for use of “melted velvet tiger jizz.”
Melted velvet tiger jizz! Melted velvet tiger jizz! MELTED VELVET TIGER JIZZ!
I’m sure it’s fun to change things. My main beef is that the comics page is screwed up. “I, Anonymous” and Karmel’s new column are in a microscopic font which couldn’t state more clearly “If you’re older than 27, don’t even try reading this.”
Finally, I have nothing against Ian, but why have him displace ArtHole? That gave local photogs and artists a hope of getting their work in the Merc. Just as Obama gets reelected, it’s not the time to get all elitist on our collective ass. BRING BACK ARTHOLE!
Todd: how many times were you featured in ArtHole?
Art Hole which evolved from the Phart Chart which evolved from the Photo Lottery isn’t gone. It’s getting redesigned. I won’t say much more about it untill it’s ready, but the redesign will connect Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, and of course Flickr in a velvet tiger jizzly smooth way.
Ann Romano hasn’t changed her hairstyle in years. Kip must be a fan of side parts, I guess.
To answer your question about Hawaii ROM: Hell Yes! I would be surfing in warm water right now. But Portland is my home.
A few times, ROM. I haven’t been submitting many photos in recent months, but I still enjoyed seeing what other people came up with.
Thanks, Scrappers. Didn’t mean to sound so demanding there. Guess I’m still in election mode.
Some fucking navigation bar. The links are all broken.
definitely missing the arthole. and what’s the reason for the move to wednesdays? I’m in favor of it, just curious.