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Fabien Baron
'Putting too much interpretation into design is not good . . . For me, the reasons behind it are more primitive than philosophical or sociological'
Fabien Baron was born in Antony, France in 1959. He studied at Arts Appliqués in Paris from 1975-76 before taking a job in the art department at L'Equipe. In 1982 he moved from Paris to New York, first working at Self and GQ magazines. In 1987 he designed the prototype for New York Woman and was the magazine's art director for its first year. While there, he was appointed creative director of Italian Vogue and began dividing his time between New York and Milan. He returned to New York in 1990 to open his company Baron & Baron and guide the relaunch of Interview magazine. In 1992 he became creative director or Harper's Bazaar, for which he has won numerous awards from the American Society of Magazine Editors and the Society of Publication Designers. Baron & Baron has designed advertising campaigns for many of the leading names in fashion, including Issey Miyake, Hugo Boss, Giorgio Armani, Valentino, Pucci, Michael Kors and Norma Kamali. Baron is creative director at Calvin Klein. The studio's portfolio also includes creative direction of Madonna's Sex book, Erotica video, and album packaging; the design of Robert Altman's Pret-a-Porter book; and graphic identities for Ian Shrager Hotels. Baron has overseen a number of fragrance launches, including Issey Miyake's L'Eau d'Issey and Calvin Klein's cK one.
J. Abbott Miller: How did you come to design magazines in the first place? Your father was an art director, wasn't he?
Fabien Baron: Yes. He's done several magazines and a lot of newspapers.
JAM: Did you go to art school?
FB: Just for a year. I wanted to check it out. I enjoyed it, but I thought it was a bit slow. I was already focused on what I wanted to do, so I decided I might as well move on to what I wanted right away.
JAM: Was it a classic design fundamentals course, or was it more trade oriented?
FB: It was more general arts - photography, design, sculpture, painting. It's a good idea for someone who wants to be in the art field but doesn't know where to go because you have the chance to play with many different media.
JAM: It wasn't a Bauhaus-inspired introduction to the fundamentals of design?
FB: No, no. Even the design course was primitive.
JAM: I think of French design as dominated by illustration and not very typographic. Yet the direction of your work has been towards a strong emphasis on typography.
FB: Maybe that's why I left France -it didn't really offer the opportunity to do anything different. At any rate, I felt the need to come to the US intuitively.
JAM: What was formative in your early jobs?
FB: There were some jobs that were so tedious you cannot imagine it: staying all day long in a stat room, staying all day long at a desk doing mechanicals. But I did the mechanicals, and I would say, 'Wouldn't it be easier if you had three columns on top?' And they began to say, 'Hmm, maybe you should do more than just mechanicals.'
JAM: So when you arrived at Condé Nast, you were still at a relatively low level?
FB: No! I was an art director already, for a music magazine. But what is an art director?
JAM: That's one of my questions.
FB: It doesn't mean much. It simply means someone who is doing the job. At first I had to do everything, there was no team. But it was fun, and I was designing a lot, giving ideas to different magazines.
JAM: Were you consciously bringing some particular aesthetic to those magazines?
FB: Definitely.
JAM: No. It's funny, but when I look back, I see a little of what's going on today. It's very clean and organised and well put together. I had to invent a lot of things because I didn't have much to work with and I wanted to make it interesting. That's what creates ideas: solving problems with nothing. So when I moved to a big magazine with money where you can do whatever you want and I saw people getting stuck, I'd say, 'Don't worry'. Because I'm used to doing things with nothing ... (extract)
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