50 Top 10 Lists of 2007

Top 10 Magazine Covers

#7. i-D
December 2007/January 2008

i-D is a fashion and style magazine, and this cover communicates both. The model, chameleon-like actress Cate Blanchett, strikes a pose of sculptural, emotionally ambiguous cool. The photo is basically a study in color and composition, making no real attempt to leverage Blanchett's fame. She wears a cross between a beekeeper's bonnet and a fencing mask. Her pale pink skin plays perfectly off the metallic blue background. One of her eyes is completely covered by a giant yellow spit curl. The other peers through mesh with a supersaturated blue iris. Red lipstick completes the color triad long-ago recommended to me by a codger at a printing plant, when I got too fussy about color: "Stick to the primaries, kid." This cover speaks. It's crisp. It's mysterious. It's modern. It's timelessly beautiful. It's way cool.

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