The Times has had a makeover today, with subtle changes throughout the paper and a full-blown redesign of features section Times 2.
Today's front page looks much the same with no tinkering to the masthead or basic lay-out but there are a few changes in store inside.
The Times has been full colour for a few weeks after the move to new printing presses in Hertfordshire earlier this year. They are already having fun with this, introducing a new colour-coded tag in the outer corner of each page to denote news, opinion, world, business and so on. This is potentially useful when you're flicking through the paper looking for something, but it does remind me a bit of Conde Nast magazine Easy Living.
Leaders have moved to page 2 - probably a good spot for them since it's easy to find and page 2 is a story graveyard anyway. It's traditionally where worthy but unsexy stories get buried, while pages 1 and 3 get all the glory.
In its place, after the opinion pages, is something called the "Daily Universal Register". Named for the original title of the Times, it's a bizarre compilation ranging from notifications of roadworks to a list of the top ten fastest mammals on earth: Grant's gazelle is faster than Thomson's gazelle - who knew?
But the biggest changes are with features section T2, where the first thing that struck me was the over-abundance of italics.
T2's bigger at 32 pages rather than 24 and features some new content - including a motoring column from Giles Smith, a children's page called "Young Times", and a rotating roster of features on health, families, fashion, the sexes and food.
The arts section is nice and meaty, with reviews and features and the retention of film section Screen on a Thursday and music section Sounds on a Friday. Thankfully, they've resisted the temptation to follow the lead of the Daily Telegraph and Daily Mail and axe daily television reviews, which often feature some great writing.
But despite some nice content, I'm not convinced it looks better. The mish-mash of fonts is distracting and the layout is confusing, with some of the articles - the nutrition and fitness page for example - looking like adverts.
The new front page of T2 has a miniature Times masthead at the top left and a large italicised times2 in blue and black down the right hand side. The previous version had horizontal times2 in block type, in either white or black with a red '2'.
Today's T2 cover story is a four-page feature on Natascha Kampusch, the Austrian girl who was kidnapped and kept in a cellar for eight years and is now launching her own TV show.
Inside, the opening spread titled "times modern" features a contents page, a new weekly comic strip, and the "editor's cut", a column on "the little things that still matter" with today's section including titbits on Kate Middleton, Fern Britton and a hedgehog.
Photographer Simon Roberts has been given a cushy job submitting one photo a week as he travels around England in a motorhome with his family. However, today's picture of ladies playing lawn bowls in Greenhill is not terribly inspiring.
What do you think of the revamped Times?
