The newspaper’s new look, which extends onto inside black-and-white pages as well, maintains The Crimson’s historically classic tone, often employing color only as an accent.

“For a paper that’s pretty traditional and by-and-large pretty conservative [in its design], you want to show some restraint in using color,” said Ron Reason of Garcia Media, the firm employed by The Crimson to consult on the redesign.

That philosophy largely mirrors the same firm’s redesign of The Wall Street Journal in 2002, which also introduced color to the front page of the newspaper.

“This has sort of been the Wall Street Journal of college newspapers for us,” said Jennifer A. George-Palilonis, also of Garcia Media.

Still, the redesign touches all aspects of the newspaper’s layout—from the creation of an in-house Crimson red to new headline fonts to graphic-heavy designs like today’s spread on mental health.

The new design elements, in appealing to scanning eyes, follow a growing trend toward reader-friendly layouts among collegiate and professional newspapers. But Crimson executives and outside consultants involved with the redesign were adamant that content would not be sacrificed by the new look.

“You need that style to get the substance out of it,” Paley said. “There’s not really a trade-off.”

The redesign represents the first large-scale design change at the newspaper since 1991 and the most significant alteration since January 1974, when The Crimson began using its own offset press.

‘Brute Force and Finesse'

The new arrangement at The Crimson retains most of the 1974 equipment.

But installing the new color units in the quirky basement caverns of The Crimson’s 14 Plympton St. home required a mix of “brute force and finesse,” according to Tom Loesch, president of Impressions Worldwide, which supplied and installed the new equipment.

“I think one of the things I suggested when we met over a year ago was getting the press the hell out of the basement,” recalled Loesch. “The location actually really determined the parameters of the expansion. We were quite limited as to what we could do.”

Workers, however, managed to rig a gantry system to lower the five-ton units—described by Loesch as “late ’80s, early ’90s technology”—into the basement.

With the new presses installed, Byrne’s job as The Crimson’s sole press operator, a position he has held for 22 years, has become suddenly more complicated.

“There’s an advanced skill level required and, frankly, an art to operating the new press,” said Loesch. “It’s a lot easier to hit the buttons and knock out a black-and-white press run.”