A Day on Paper
In Praise of Diaries
I’ve used the Smythson Panama diary long enough to remember controversial design changes. (Actually they call it a weekly agenda, but I treat it more as a diary.) A decade ago they removed the period at the end of the year on the cover. This got the partisans worked up. It turns out when you look at something every day you become very attached to it. When the font changes or the spacing of numbers is slightly streamlined, people think it’s an abomination.
I thought everybody was overreacting but then they discontinued the dark blue smooth leather cover and I nearly lost my mind. You recover of course. Like every redesign, whether the iPhone or the NY Times homepage, you get used to the new one in a week and can’t even remember what got you riled up in the first place.