Connecticut Post launches redesign today
The Connecticut Post of Bridgeport — circulation 76,014 — launched a redesign today.
On the left is Tuesday’s front. On the right is today’s:
Design edtior Lee Steele tells us:
The fonts are Zocalo and Amplitude from Font Bureau.
We were given a boost from our consultant Frank Mina, the ame/presentation at the San Francisco Chronicle. We wanted to do a better job integrating our columnists, consumer pieces and old-fashioned local news. Also, our navigation was a big priority.
We also wanted to send a message that we’re new and that we represent today’s world. We tossed out anything that seemed traditional. Up until now, we’ve always held on to something that communicated our long heritage and sense of being an institution.
A closer look at the new front reveals one of the best things about today’s relaunch:
And that’s compelling news. Forget all the house ads and the reader’s guides and the introductory columns from your editor. The very best way to knock a reader’s socks off with a redesigned newspaper is to have a huge story that gets folks talking. The Post did that today with the huge profile of the accused Times Square bomber. Which is a local story for the Post.
Read the story by Kate Ramunni – and see all the documents — here.
We’re a local paper. We consider that our strength. So how does our nation/world presentation figure in? We’ve broken away from a conventional layout. Frank Mina of the San Francisco Chronicle came up with this:
Aha. I’ve not seen one of those since the old pink-flamingo days of the Boca Raton News. Very interesting.
Other features of the new design, according to a story in today’s paper:
- Larger body copy.
- Ganging local stories onto a “second local front” on page A5.
- More local maps.
- More quotes from local folks on the opinion page.
- A new investigative reporting team.
- A consumer complaint column.
Find the Post’s story about its redesign here. Find Lee Steele’s blog here.
May 5th, 2010 at 9:56 am
I really like that inside brief page. It’s a really interesting idea matching the photos with the numbered blurbs. And I don’t recall seeing anything like that recently.
The world map, though, seems a little … arbitrary? Unnecessary? I understand what they are trying to do … and I guess a map would work best if you have a number of briefs from all over the world. It adds a visual element, but I feel like it’s just for the sake of having one. I don’t think it adds much. Also, I think I’d like it without the big headline for the first brief. Again, I get why they did it, but I’d like to see them experiment with that section a bit.
May 5th, 2010 at 1:41 pm
I agree with Krissi but come to a different conclusion with it. If I were the Connecticut Post, I’d do two maps – one for the U.S. and one for the rest of the world. The problem they face is that people are going to want more detail for that U.S. map than the rest of the world, making the function of the map somewhat cluttered when it’s the same size as everything else. Just look at all the dots. It’s kind of a mess.
Don’t lose the map. Instead, make the U.S. more prominent somehow.
That said, I really like the design of the paper in general. And what a way to start! Huge national story with a local tie.
May 5th, 2010 at 1:56 pm
Again, this briefs-key-to-a-map thing was done in the Boca Raton paper, back in the very early 1990s. It was an experimental “paper of the future” thing by Knight-Ridder. The way theirs worked was with two maps: A world map and a national map.
There’s also a nationally-syndicated feature focusing on ecological stories — I forget the name of it, but it’ll come to me alter — that includes a world map keyed to briefs.
The trend in most places to to cram more text into every hole. So I find it interesting that Bridgeport is bucking the trend and going with LARGER visuals.
May 5th, 2010 at 3:11 pm
I really enjoy the new look. It’s nice, clean and very open. And I agree, what an awesome story to have kick off the redesign. I do like how it was presented a lot. The documents I find to be a lot more intriguing than a mug shot or generic arrest photo. Great job!
May 5th, 2010 at 3:15 pm
Can be done with smaller maps, although you can end up with the trouble you see here of too much originating in NY and DC. I like the maps, given so few people know their geography. I think with photos in particular, you really have an opportunity to ’span the globe’ in search of TOPIX. But if you run a lot of politics and policy briefs, you’ll have a lot of the same datelines.