Layout (Graphic Idea Resource) - Softcover

Joyce Rutter Kaye is managing editor of U&lc, the quarterly international journal of typography and graphic design published by International Typeface Corporation (ITC). Before joining ITC in May 1991, Kaye was a writer and editor for Advertising Ages monthly magazine, Creativity. Kaye is author of Print Casebooks 10: The Best in Advertising (RC Publications), and contributes regularly to Print and other graphic design publications. Kaye received a Bachelor of Science degree in Magazine Journalism in 1985 from the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications of Syracuse University.

Graphic design is a bit like cooking. When you begin the creative process, you follow basic structure, using the essential ingredients of type, color, paper, and format, along with a pinch of intuition and a dash of inspiration. You then stir it all together an hope for the best results.

The best graphic design layouts have a balance of flavors that harmonize to create an effective message. Like a great meal, in their ideal form layouts should engage the senses and create an unforgettable moment. The best layouts reveal that the designer trusts his or her instincts to know what is appropriate for the intended audience. Sometimes that means incorporating an element of surprise - using for example, purely type on a brochure to promote a photographer, or photographs of dancers to highlight the elegant lines of a line of eyeglasses. Wit and humor can also be an effective way to engage a consumer's attention, through a clever use of graphic icons to make a visual pun or through deliberately jarring use of contrasting color or type.