Style combination · Pairs well

Slow-Living Editorial × Scandinavian Functionalism

The magazine moved to Copenhagen in 2015 and opened a gallery designed by Norm Architects; borrow Nordic furniture, plain materials and clear sans-serif signage to give the soft photography a sturdier, more architectural frame.

From the research on Slow-Living Editorial (the Kinfolk Look)

Mix them and make something Slow-Living Editorial Scandinavian Functionalism

A sample layout drawn from the recipe: shapes from Slow-Living Editorial, their arrangement from Scandinavian Functionalism, the finish from Slow-Living Editorial. Not a real work, and not an image of either style.

What each style brings

Each part of the design comes from the style with the stronger say in it, and each style gives at least two.

Slow-Living Editorial (the Kinfolk Look) Scandinavian Functionalism

Type from Slow-Living Editorial: Humanist & Garalde serif
Wide letterspacing
Colour from Scandinavian Functionalism: Flat fields
Analogous harmony
Form from Slow-Living Editorial: Naturalistic depiction
Ornament-free
Composition from Scandinavian Functionalism: Generous white space
Column grid
Surface from Slow-Living Editorial: Grain & noise

The type

Open fonts standing in for each style’s own type, which is often hand-drawn or commercial.

Display · Slow-Living Editorial

Hello

EB Garamond, standing in for Garamond, Kinfolk's brand typeface, kept for body text through Charlotte Heal's 2015 redesign (It's Nice That, 2015)

Text · Scandinavian Functionalism

Nordic functionalism (funkis) arrived in graphic form with Sigurd Lewerentz's posters and winged emblem for the 1930 Stockholm Exhibition. It adapted Bauhaus rationalism to a social-democratic ideal of beautiful everyday things for everyone. Its graphic language is modernism with warmth: clear sans-serif or humane serif type, generous space, friendly simplified symbols and colours taken from nature, applied to public services, consumer goods and national identities.

Jost; Scandinavian Functionalism used Futura and Berling Antikva

The colours

The ground and leading colours come from Scandinavian Functionalism, with a counter-accent from Slow-Living Editorial. The ink reads on the ground at 4.5:1 or more.

Slow-Living Editorial (the Kinfolk Look) Scandinavian Functionalism

#f6f3ec ground · 36%
#1f2a37 ink · 14%
#e3b53a accent · 18%
#9a7b5f accent · 14%
#a63a2a accent · 10%
#dfcabf accent · 8%

As CSS

:root {
  --ground: #f6f3ec;
  --ink: #1f2a37;
  --accent-1: #e3b53a;
  --accent-2: #9a7b5f;
  --accent-3: #a63a2a;
  --accent-4: #dfcabf;
  --font-display: "EB Garamond", serif;
  --font-text: "Jost", sans-serif;
}

Use it with care

Slow-Living Editorial (the Kinfolk Look): Kinfolk and Cereal are living titles with their own mastheads and photographers: take the method (natural light, wide margins, a quiet serif), shoot or license your own pictures, and never letter the KINFOLK masthead or present a layout as an issue. Critics noted that its early pages pictured mostly young, white and beautiful people; cast, locate and style photographs widely so the calm does not become a single social type. By 2016 the magazine itself was casting more widely (FIT Library blog), so take the later issues, not the early imitators, as the model.