Behind the Cover

Left: The November cover designed by Jeffrey Lai
Right: Alternate cover with photograph by Michael Wolf

As financial markets crashed and the future of our economy remained unclear, we decided not to make Michael Wolf’s photographs of the American office our cover. Though timely and powerful, his almost Hopperesque images didn’t evoke the inspiring and empowering message that we felt our readers needed during this time of uncertainty. But Eero Saarinen’s firm was our perfect cover story. His office spawned a revolution in thinking that continues to influence firms all over the world. Since Saarinen’s architectural education began at Yale, we felt it was appropriate to pass off this cover design to a fellow alumnus, Jeffrey Lai. He used a wonderful historical photo by Balthazar Korab showing Saarinen working on the TWA model with a very young Cesar Pelli and Sam Luderowski.