I.D. Magazine Folds

image source: I.D. Magazine

The latest casualty of the print vs. web wars is venerable design magazine I.D. (not to be confused with British fashion mag i-D).  I.D.’s publisher F+W Media announced Tuesday that the magazine will cease publication with its January/February 2010 issue.  Published since 1954 and first known as Industrial Design, the magazine was rebranded I.D. in the 1980s to stand stand for International Design and to reflect the publication’s multi-disciplinary focus. 

I.D. came to be a resource for architectural, product, fashion, and graphic designers alike, highlighting wildly conceptual designs alongside savvy coverage of the business of design.  Each year I.D. published its Annual Design Review issue (click for a slideshow of last year’s winners), with a peer jury selecting the best of the year from thousands of submissions in categories such Consumer Products, Furniture, and Concepts.  In Tuesday’s press release,  F+W’s editorial director Gary Lynch noted that “F+W Media will continue producing the I.D. Annual Design Review…  in an expanded fashion online.”  Winners last year ranged from Perkins Eastman’s TKTS booth in Times Square to Carbon Design Group’s design for the Nanopoint cellTRAY Fluidics System (a tool used by scientists to study the interactions between chemicals on the molecular level), indicating the wide scope of the Annual Design Review and the broadening, which I.D. championed, of the definition of “design.”

It’s some consolation to this loyal reader that the Annual Design Review will soldier on, at least for 2010, but sad still that this publication, which seemed so vital to the design community in its print form, will soon only be a collector’s item.  Below, for nostalgia’s sake, are several covers from the magazine’s long history.

2nd Issue (April 1954) designed by Alvin Lustig;
image source: Articles & Texticles

February 1966; image source: Brainiac Books

June 1966; image source and purchasing info: Itis Edition

August 1970; image source and purchasing info: Itis Edition

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