As Tiffany Meyers observes in her overview of the 100 winners (page 46), one can’t peg 2009 as the year of any specific color or typographic convention. But the winning projects are reflective of today’s increasingly diverse design discipline. In fact, one has to wonder if there is any longer such a thing as a design discipline—in light of today’s fast-changing and even amorphous practice, the word discipline seems a little out of place.

Yes, there’s type and image and problem-solving in abundance among this year’s winners. There’s art in the service of commerce, and there’s art for the benefit of public service. There are the usual categories: identities, packaging, posters, etc. (Of course there are no web or motion graphics works—those go into our Best of Web competition, which is now open for entries.) The winning works are superb in impact and overall aesthetic quality, and as Meyers notes, they are very much in harmony with 2009’s disdain for glitz, gloss and ostentation … and aΩection for sustainability, restraint and e≈ciency.

It is with the greatest respect (and, to be honest, something approaching awe) that we thank our panel of Design 100 judges for 2009: Marian Bantjes, Richard Boynton, Pum Lefebure, Scott Stowell and Martin Venezky. It was a great honor—and great fun—to benefit from the insight of this distinguished group, each of whom represents the highest levels of accomplishment in the profession.

The multiple modalities and directions exhibited in 2009’s 100 forward-thinking winning projects are embodied in this issue’s cover, created by one of today’s most energetic studios, Design Army of Washington, D.C. Co-principal Pum Lefebure links this design closely with the zeitgeist:

“As we head into 2009, we know the year will be filled with new twists and turns that are sure to impact our industry—new opportunities to secure new clients, new marketing tactics to spark the sales slumps, new talent (some old) looking for a new job, new technology to stay connected, new magazines ... pretty much new everything as the economy resets. It will be a confusing path for some and an easy transition for others. Yet in the end we all hope to end up in the same place—ahead of the pack.”

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Twenty-five years ago, a design magazine was launched to bring the state of the art in graphics to design professionals. Billed as “the how-to reference magazine for visual communicators,” Step-by-Step Graphics was an audacious bid to explore the evolving techniques for graphics problem-solving—which were about to make a quantum jump into the desktop publishing revolution. And as that revolution was consolidated, STEP inside design magazine again kept pace, revealing the world of design from the inside out and going beyond the “who” and the “how” to explore the “why” of contemporary design.

In the next few months, STEP will be combining forces with our sister magazine Dynamic Graphics to launch an all-new bimonthly publication, Create. Like STEP, Create magazine will bring you the most exciting work, voices and events in the world of design, with an expanded vision of the profession. You’ll see more web, interactive and motion design work, all presented with the same commitment to exploring the “what’s next?” factor.

In short, Create will be everything we hope you value STEP for—only more of it, with a wider perspective on the visual culture of the 21st century. STEP subscribers, never fear: Your subscription will be honored in full (more information).

And we intend to continue our Best of Web competition that’s now under way, along with the 2010 edition of the Design 100. Design is a moving target. Our goal has always been to capture—on the fly—the vanguard of this ever-evolving field and portray it to you in its most vivid, impactful and ultimately useful form. This will continue to be our goal in the all-new Create magazine. Watch for it.

Tom Biederbeck, editor
tbiederbeck@graphics.com