Vote for your Cover of the Year 2019

Beano reaching its 4,000th issue, whilst important to the comic, is not something we felt would speak directly to our readers. Therefore, by using the number 4,000 as a year rather some intangible number, it gave the cover resonance to casual readers as well as fans. Looking forward to the year 4000 led us to set our main story in a dystopian future where Beano had been banned. The idea was attuned to the current concerns of our 6-11 year old readers as the present day characters see the damage adults have wrought on the future and set out to fix it. The cover captures the excitement of the anniversary and storyline with the huge ‘4000’ integrated into the explosive cover design. The diversity of the characters reflects our readership and their individualisms. The cover was received exceptionally well with readers, estimated to sell 21,000 at newsstand, up +15.2% YOY.

Best for babies? – asks Connect, the magazine for members of Crohn’s & Colitis UK. The photo shows a reader breastfeeding her 13-month-old daughter. Breastfeeding is a hot topic for new and expectant mothers, and it becomes an even more complicated one for people living with Crohn’s disease or colitis. The magazine explores this – in particular looking at the effect of IBD drugs on breast milk and the challenges parents face. “I just wanted to say how uplifted I was to open the envelope containing Connect magazine and see the feature on breastfeeding and IBD on the cover. There is so much misunderstanding about medication and breastfeeding so it’s just great to see this. I was delighted to see an older baby on the cover, and some of the mothers interviewed had breastfed their babies into toddlerhood. It’s rare for features like this to be in mainstream media, so well done Connect!”

For the first time, a theme was chosen for the 2019 edition – What the world needs now – which ties in closely with the University’s vision of making the world a better place. To add impact to the theme we took an innovative approach to the cover. We ran a competition for the University’s illustration students to produce an original A3 wraparound artwork. The winning entry showed a community collaborating to find the key to what the world needs to be a better place. The cover offers a striking and unexpected alternative to a standard magazine cover. The artwork speaks for itself, has universal appeal and gives the University’s logo and EDIT masthead space to stand out clearly. It sets the tone for the 2019 edition by emphasising the fact that despite often gloomy depictions, the world is a positive, proactive and people-orientated place.

“I like to paint… or I make things… I have a thing where I make models of buses… I don’t make models of buses,” said the eloquent Boris Johnson in June, in the midst of the Tory Leadership contest which ultimately lead to his selection as Prime Minister. For our 1 July issue, our cover looked at the likely outcome of Boris Johnson becoming the next Prime Minister, and made light of his recent interview. This cover exemplifies Holyrood’s witty and independent voice and resonated with our politically-engaged audience, who were keenly following developments with Tory leadership contest. Graphically, the cover really grabs you – with strong use of illustration, typography and colour – inviting you to pick up the magazine and dive in.

April’s cover of Hood magazine is the most popular yet, and the most-liked on Instagram by Hood readers. The cover uses a highly unusual and striking monochromatic main image, set against yellow typography for a dramatic yet stylish look. The model represents the diversity of the real women living in Scotland today and proved incredibly popular with readers. A mix of cursive and classic fonts were used, with a variety of bright and striking colours, to retain design consistency whilst adding an element of the unexpected. The cover lines on this issue were chosen to represent the issue’s theme of wellness, with intriguing language used to sell the stories within, and a feeling of sisterhood and supportiveness not often found in women’s publications. Never judgemental but always encouraging, Hood’s cover line language is friendly and open, to inspire readers with its relatable and inclusive content.

Tes Scotland aims to provide essential intelligence for education professionals – but yet prides itself on being an entertaining read that makes “work” feel less like work. The spring term is among the hardest times of the year for anyone in education, and this stunning cover appeared just as the final weeks and months of the school term were beginning. In true Tes Scotland style, the cover draws in its readers and sparks their interest in the cover feature – and does so using subtle humour and wit. With its bright, clean design it truly stood out on the news stand, and the effective execution of the “wig” theme – later carried through the feature in the magazine- drew the potential reader in without being confusing or shocking. The imagery does not distract from the strap line and research-led feature, but instead is understated and elegant while still piquing interest.

Each week The Big Issue's cover is our billboard - it must stand out on the street, shout boldly about content in that edition and grab people's attention so they stop and buy a copy. In turbulent and confusing political times we needed to address Brexit in an arresting way, make a statement about the confusion and uncertainty, and be strong enough to make a huge impact. It needed an illustrator with savage political wit, a satirist of the highest order with a style as powerful and recognisable as The Big Issue's own. That artist was of course Ralph Steadman. His illustration of Boris Johnson captures the politically explosive, messy period, with parliament illegally prorogued and chaos reigning in Westminster and beyond: a fierce, challenging, unique, distinctive piece of art. Our #BorisBigIssue campaign was hugely successful, incorporating a video showing Steadman working in the studio to create this exclusive cover.

This cover is from The Skinny's August issue, our biggest publication of the year marking the Edinburgh Festivals and a massively expanded potential audience. This cover has to communicate multiple ideas simultaneously – facing out to new readers, telling them what we stand for in terms of cross cultural writing, diversity, inclusion, platforming emergent artists; keeping loyal readers across Scotland on board with an acknowledgement of some of their concerns about pervarsive festivalisation; communicating some of the issue's content (of course); and standing out with high quality design and illustration in a highly saturated print marketplace. A bespoke illustration by Ida Henrich masterfully incorporates many of these concepts while also conveying our brand aim of offering a warm guiding hand to Scottish culture, the festivals' at times overwhelming nature acknowledged by a headline beautifully typeset by our designer Fiona Hunter.