Industry: Design

New type for Rolling Stone

Swashes on the upright, not just the italic

Commercial Type designed a custom type palette for Rolling Stone's 2024 redesign, led by Richard Turley and Mark Leeds working with Creative Director Joe Hutchinson. The centrepiece is Rolling Stone Slab, drawn by Tim Ripper, a condensed Egyptian building on his Successor revival and referencing Dennis Ortiz-Lopez's custom slabs from the Woodward–Anderson era of the 1990s. Swash capitals for the Deck Regular were added by Julien Priez and applied to the upright as well as the italic, with the upright version preferred for its surreal quality. The redesign also shifted to heavyweight newsprint and increased body copy point size to restore editorial density.

Set in Rolling Stone Slab, Feature Flat Text, Feature Flat Deck

Insights

Subtle corner and serif-ending rounding softened the monolithic quality of a bold condensed slab without making it look casual.
A higher-contrast display cut was developed for feature layouts, taking tonal cues from the 1990s Woodward–Anderson era.
Priez added swashes to the upright as well as the italic; Turley and Leeds preferred the upright application for its surreal quality over the conventional italic approach.
The guiding principle was to 'look like Rolling Stone' without directly quoting historical design; elements already working, such as Jesse Ragan's nameplate update, were left unchanged.