It was remarkably difficult to find a well designed magazine article. My first target was Time, copies of which abound at the office, but looking at it with a designer's eye produced disheartening results. I saw little attention to the rule of thirds, photos and pull quotes scattered haphazardly and questionable white space.
My wife came to my rescue, though, when she found me an issue of Scientific American Mind. This is respectable design here. The article uses a classic three-column layout, very popular for magazines because short line lengths are easy for the eye to take in, and the addition of thin lines between columns also helps guide the reader. The serif body font, which helps carry the eye from one character to the next, is printed in just about the perfect size: small enough to prevent the phrases from becoming choppy, and large enough to ward off eyestrain.
I don't generally like pull quotes, as I find them disruptive and redundant, but putting one at the top of the right-hand page acts almost like a second headline to attract attention. This works very well because it grabs a casual page-turner, but then becomes unobtrusive and out-of-the-way when you start to actually read the article. The section headings are in a different color and a contrasting sans-serif font, and they add some needed texture without being distracting.
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