THE JUBILEE is almost upon us, and that is reflected(!) in the IPC Editors’ Group’s covers of the month.

Overall winner is Horse & Hound for its portrayal of  ’Britain’s best-loved horsewoman’. No, it’s not Katie Price, it is of course, Her Madge.

There must be something about the royal family that just gets magazine editors all excited. Kill the coverlines! Make the picture black and white! Silver foil block the logo! And so it is with this really excellent cover. I love it when a brand identifies a high value subject (or ruler!) and proves decisively that it truly owns them. Vogue does it, but it’s still a pretty rare event. Here, Horse & Hound shows that despite everything, the Queen is a Horse & Hound reader at heart. 

woman&home also goes the way of foil blocking the logo. Major props to the art team for skilfully negotiating the issue of web wander where the foil hits the Queen’s head. Sorry, I mean Helen’s hair. My wife saw this cover in the newsagent, which is triumph enough these days, and although she didn’t buy it, the cover had generated a huge conversation in her mind. “I’d probably really like it,” she mused. “Does this mean I’m middle class?” I have no doubt she’ll part with her money for this fine magazine sooner or later. The cover is, of course, excellent, as you would expect from a brand this strong. Everything is present and correct, including Helen’s hand tattoo. Class.

TV & Satellite Week is IPC Connect’s cover of the month with its four-way split on the judges for The Voice. Personally, I go Team Tom, but that’s the whole point of this technique. Readers should be able to have the debate about which cover to buy, but key to this will be display. I hope they get enough of it, so it can be seen that there really is a choice. Execution is of course excellent, with the usual hi-def approach to all the cover elements. Great work.

Nuts was the clear winner of the Cover of the Month for December, with the excellent Homes & Gardens and TV & Satellite week both divisional winners.

Christmas double issues are a big deal in publishing, and as in recent years, Nuts has pulled out all the stops. The logo is sparkly ‘Nutsian’ foil, the girls are pictured in a genuine winter wonderland, and the penguins were flown in specially.Nuts is a provocative magazine, and that’s no bad thing. The great designer Tibor Kalman once said: ‘When you make something no one hates, no one loves it’.

 But people do love Nuts for many good reasons. Sure, there are pictures of girls wearing very little, but that does not make it the same as  Zoo, Loaded, FHM or even GQ. The Nuts tone is knowing, self deprecating and genuinely funny. That’s why it outsells every other men’s magazine two to one.

 Art director Simon Freeborough’s typography is perfectly judged. Suitably ironic (check out The Beano), and yet still possessing enough punch to stand out on the newsstand. Likewise, editor Dom Smith has enough confidence in his brand to let Nuts alone deliver the splash line, instead of the more usual ‘Sophie presents…’.

This is a terrific cover, and a worthy winner.

Here are the other two winners…

I do wonder about the ease with which Chat’s editor Gilly Sinclair peels off her brilliant coverlines. ‘My bum needs its own sofa’, ‘Sliced Off! I castrated my evil dad’, ‘Saved from the pot! What a lucky plucker…’. It all seems to suggest an imagination that frankly, I’d rather not know too much about!

Much like a tabloid newspaper, in a real-life weekly it’s often the words are the most important visual component. It is they that create images in your mind, they that deliver colour, and they that determine the layout of the page.

Right from the very first issue (Knit your own Royal Family!) Chat’s lines have always been a shrewd blend of knowing gags, weird shit and truly shocking ideas. It’s voyeuristic, nihilistic, and often entirely unrealistic. Like its readers, it really does live in the moment, as evidenced by the genius strapline: ‘Life! Death! Prizes!’

But the world is becoming ever more visual, so Chat has responded with this new and significantly improved cover design. The key decision is to make the lead story image the canvas that carries the splash line. It’s subtle, but very effective in establishing the primacy and cut-through of the lead story. There are fewer stories overall, only five against the market’s usual six, but they have more room, and are well detailed, so there’s no loss of value.

The ‘new’ messaging is worth noting also. As well as the monster blob top left, the new franchises are continually labelled as such, allowing art editor Rob Plowright-Taylor to let the whole package literally crackle with a sense of excitement.

InStyle is the IPC Southbank cover of the month, with its elegant and understated Rosamund Pike cover. InStyle was also the overall winner last month, and I have been remiss in not posting on it back then.

InStyle UK is one of many international editions of American InStyle, and as such faces real tensions when it comes to deciding how far it can deviate from the original brand proposition. In the US, InStyle is a massive brand, due in no small part to the fact that their biggest domestic celebrities are massive Hollywood A-listers, as opposed to the UK’s motley crew of soapstars, reality TV judges and glamour girls.

Editor Eilidh MacAskill’s big success has been to take the US formula and dramatically reinvent it for a very demanding British audience. She’s made the magazine cool, whilst retaining a high level of fashion service, celebrity style and beauty know-how.

This cover follows the same pattern as last month’s excellent 10th birthday issue. An immaculate colour palette, a cover star with genuine fashion authority, and the confidence of new art director Adele Chidwick in using white space to convey a sense of quality and true value.

Rugby World is the IPC Inspire cover of the month with this genuinely startling presentation of Johnny Wilkinson. I love this cover for the fact that it really looks modern! The lines are in a well chosen font, macho, but contemporary. The picture, well, Johnny appears to be wearing some sort of medieval snood. Bang on trend, I’m sure.

But the killer play is the great confidence around the use of colour, blue in this instance. Art editor Kevin Eason has moved away from the downward drag of an always red logo and fully engaged with the idea that every cover must look both timeless and timely in equal measure. Really good work.

Follow Andy Cowles on Twitter http://twitter.com/#!andycowles1

THIS Motor Boat & Yachting cover is excellent, but intriguingly similar to their November 2010 cover of the month. Well, it worked once, it’ll probably work twice! Here’s what I wrote back in 2010:

“There is a certain convention to motor boat magazine covers. I remember years back, looking at a title called Sportsboat, which had, as convention decrees, the sharp prow of the boat looming out toward me. And perched right on the tip of it, was a very pretty blond girl.

If I have a complaint, it’s the drop-in of the other two boats in the bottom corner. I am sure there are good commercial and newsstand reasons why this had to be done, but it does take the legs away from the splash. If I know the names of these boats, I’ll pick it up. If it’s really about Aft Cabins as a genre, then I’d want to see those words bigger than the 12pt within the pink bar. But if it’s still all about the fantasy of what kind of man I truly imagine myself to be, then looking at these two ugly caravans on a keel just doesn’t do it!”

To be honest, much of those observations still apply. Art Direction, colourway, and typography are all just as good, and just about the same. But there are two significant improvements worth noting. Firstly, the panel holding additional boat pics looks really well integrated here. It demonstrates how you can add loads of visual value without denting the premium feel one jot.

Secondly, and I think this is a first for an IPC title, there is a pink button advising the reader to ‘get MBY on your iPad’. The genius of this is not that anyone will go to the link and download the app, but that it is a staggeringly clear message that the readers of MBY all have iPads. If you’re a brand loyalist you’ll be flattered, if you have an iPad, you’ll see yourself reflected in the cover, and if you’re an advertiser you’ll see that MBY is genuinely right out in front.

I’M delighted to see TV Times up on the IPC café wall. It’s a brilliant title, with a high level of cover craft. Well loved people, well shot are the key to their success. This is no exception, it’s fun, it’s friendly and it’s only in TV Times.

LOOK makes the wall for the second month running with the confident assertion that Ange really is furious with Brad this time. Of course she is. But I would encourage the reader to go past the headline and look instead at the fantastic way the colours are managed.

The logo is beautifully rendered with many shades of pink, the fashion splash is black, but the outline lets it pop, and the blue of the Tulisa drop-in makes it clear that this is another story without denting the weekly fashion magazine aesthetic. Nice work all round.

All three covers of the month are top notch, but I am delighted that What’s on TV edged it to become the overall winner this month. Although What’s on TV is not at the ‘glamour’ end of the business, it produces genius pieces of work, like this cover. As a brand it completely defines the budget TV listings market. Often copied, but never bettered: it invented the conventions, adheres to them and constantly enhances them to maximum effect.

The content pops from a blue back plate. And here, the glow adds an additional level of movement and feeling. The yellow splash is present and correct, but the black outline has been turned all the way up to eleven. You could see this coverline from space! It’s important to visualise the price clearly, which is why green is such a shrewd move. It stands out from all the other colours, yet never gets in front of the content. Dark blue and magenta add accents, but overall, the colour palette is pretty restrained to let the splash stand out.

The lines are really good too. Absolute brevity and focus on what’s important, which in this market is ‘Family’, closely followed by ‘Tragedy’.

Nuts and Look snagged the other two spots, and both really deserve the recognition.

Nuts had the true splash of the month with their timely presentation of Imogen, Ryan Gigg’s ‘young lady’.

This is quality ‘talk-about content’. And it’s testament to the power of the brand and the skill of the team that it’s Nuts that Imogen chose to favour with her, ahem favours. Fantastic work.

Look is now published as part of IPC Southbank, so this is its first cover of the month as a Southbank title. 

The true art to this cover is the tension between juicy celeb gossip and tons of affordable fashion. You’ve got to pack it on and heat it up, whilst never letting go of fashion authority, which is the key to unlocking the value of the brand.

And here, they’ve done a great job. The cast list is fresh, the lines compelling, and the fashion desirable. On top of that, the discounts are strongly presented without messing up their aesthetic corridor too much!

COUNTRY LIFE hit the ball out of the park in the Editors’ Group Cover of The Month award.

Aside from the fact this issue was up a staggering 93% yoy, the work demonstrates what a team can do when its confidence is high. Everything about this cover points to the values behind the brand.

There is restraint, demonstrated by the elegantly framed picture and cool matt finish. It feels timeless. It’s a collectors’ issue and looks like it. It’s reassuringly expensive, as shown by the embossed gold logo.

But the masterstroke is surely the Royal Crest. Editor Mark Hedges tells me that he had ring up Clarence House to get permission to use it – clearly the Boss was quite happy to take his call. Class.

Ideal Home and Woman’s Weekly picked up the other two spots, and both are well worth their awards.

Ideal Home has been going great guns this year, and this powerful package shows why.

The sense of value is absolutely explicit. There’s a free notebook and a 3 for 2 offer, all smartly presented. But the real work lies in the expert layering of type on the picture.

It looks truly packed, but stops just short of crowded. Colour control is great, with the cover, gift and packaging all working well together.

Woman’s Weekly produced its tribute to Elizabeth Taylor in two days flat. An amazing accomplishment, and one that should bear real dividends on the newsstand.

The cover picture is the winning card here. A perfect choice, well presented. And of course, the decision to publish this supplement is perfectly in line with Stolley’s Law.

Dick Stolley was the legendary editor of People magazine, who drove the title to become the biggest selling magazine in the world. Here is what he said when it comes to choosing his cover subject:

• Young is Better Than Old 
• Pretty is Better Than Ugly
• Rich is Better Than Poor
• Movies Are Better Than Television
• Television is Better Than Music
• Movies or TV or Music is Better Than Sports
• Anything is Better Than Politics
• And NOTHING is Better Than the Celebrity Dead

But what makes the cover work? Why is it flattening the opposition month in, month out?

In the first instance, it’s all about the image. Helen Mirren is often touted as the glamorous older woman, but few pictures prove it like this does. Fantastic styling, dynamic pose, and a small hand tattoo! If there is retouching, I can’t see it.

Then there are the coverlines. Like Essentials, they pack a lot on without it feeling crushed. The type has power, but I never feel I’m being over sold.

And of course, the words themselves are first class. Positive, personal and all exceptionally useful, this is a master class in how to craft lines that shift copies.

TV & Satellite week is no stranger to the honour of cover of the month, their reputation as the Grazia of TV listing titles is now pretty well set. I’ve blogged on this before and much of my comment then still holds true.

With this cover, the team have managed to get one of the BBC’s best franchises look as if they are doing it for TV& Sat and them alone. It doesn’t matter how they’ve got the access, the sharpness of the picture (look at the eyes!) proves that this is premiere division HD editorial.

The NME was the winner last month, here they are again with their 100 gigs list cover. It is a piece of Art, and needs to be enjoyed as such. It looks brilliant, but it also looks back. And that is a challenge for a title with a much younger demographic than Mojo, Uncut and Q, who are always doing this sort of thing.

That said, I think it will sell, because the picture holds a powerful pull over British Butter fanatics everywhere, regardless of age.

For what it’s worth, I really like the current NME cover, featuring the Vaccines in a post modern washed out punk pink. I’m not sure this will sell, but it certainly caught the eye of myself and Simon Freeborough when we whizzed past the stands last week. And had a pretty intense conversation around ‘pink’ as a result.

It’s the second win on the bounce for Essentials, they’re the hot IPC title right now, as their latest monster ABC rise demonstrates. This March cover is again terrific, with a powerful use of colour, and sense of dynamism to the cover shot.

Essentials is one of the few big newsstand books to not use a celebrity cover shot, the benefits of the extra control using a model gives are clear to see in the dynamic pose, the hair flick and the smart styling.

But their killer card is still the insane number of words they manage to fit on to this thing without losing legibility or a premium feel. Nice work Stuart!

Chat’s cover is a change from their usual design structure. Here the main story is even bigger and the story over the logo fills the full width. This results in the story count going from a best-in-class 8 down to a conventional 6. But this decision allows the key content to cut through faster on the newsstand, and square up much quicker to Take A Break, the market leader.

Chat is a strong brand, so it’s a good call to move from a volume play and start to leverage its tabloid potential with a bigger splash.

Like Essentials, the NME are winners for the second time in a row, but this time they’ve grabbed the overall winners award with this magnificent tribute to the White Stripes.

Given that the band have split up, here is the opportunity for the NME to choose the defining image of their career.

And this is a great picture. There is an extraordinary amount to look at and enjoy. The dark shadows under his eyes, her knowing smile, the position of the chairs emphasising his size, whilst all the while maintaining their shared body language.

I could go on and on, but I don’t need to because the cover is RED. Red is the NME’s brand colour, so all the love towards the White Stripes is able to infuse the brand, likewise the brand has a clear opportunity to claim ownership over the content.

The challenge with this cover is the tension between timeless and timeliness. The lines themselves are full of urgency, but here their presentation is more akin to what Vanity Fair might do one month later.

The NME is a weekly, just the same as Chat. Both must create a genuine sense of event, this week the NME have been handed one on a plate, and so they’ve got away with a cool aesthetic. The challenge will be next week, when they’ve got an unheard of indie band on the cover.

All said, given that no-one has actually died, the black border and RIP detail are moments of true genius.

In a recent post on Mashable, Josh Koppel of Scrollmotion whilst showing off some of his thinking around iphone / ipad interaction, towards the end he mentions that ,’the app is now the monetary unit of content’. So for example is $1.99 the correct amount for a celebrity news tracker, whilst Esquire on the ipad retails at a massive $4.99. It is also a change from the content/ad model to a content/application model. What are the interesting applications of your content that means the user will pay a premium for it?

This years Design conference brought together the many designers of IPC, for a day of presentations and workshops. Carla Franks was the guest speaker , and she gave us a presentation on ‘Inspiration’. Carla was able to talk us through her work on Oprah magazine, providing the IPC designers with an insight into the highs and lows of its launch.

Karla showed a wide range of designs and spreads. Explained with behind the scenes stories that brought the work to life. The work itself was very New York, an extraordinary attention to detail, producing spreads of great elegance. Her personal passion for photography was also clear for every one to see. Carla spoke about her personal belief in the need to constantly challenge oneself a designer. As Milton Glaser said, “To design is to communicate clearly by whatever means you can control or master.” Karla’s presentation showed she is a  master of  magazine design, and the clarity of the design work was inspiring.