Art Paul, who designed the first Playboy cover as well as the iconic bunny logo, has died aged 93, the Washington Post reports. The cover featured a photo of Marilyn at the 1952 Miss America pageant in Atlantic City, with her famous nude calendar pose making the centrefold.
“[Hugh] Hefner was developing his idea for a new men’s magazine in 1953 when he approached Mr. Paul, then working as a freelance illustrator and designer in Chicago. Hefner sought a clean, modern design for the magazine that he wanted to call Stag Party.
When another men’s publication, Stag, sent a cease-and-desist letter, Hefner was forced to come up with another name, and Playboy was born. Mr. Paul designed the first cover, a photograph of Marilyn Monroe taken during a parade as she waved to the crowd.
‘Art Paul managed to create a striking black-and-white cover design with a red logo,’ Hefner wrote in Playboy in 1994. ‘This was just the first example of how Art took ordinary pictures and, through inventive design and the addition of illustrative details, made the magazine and its covers innovative and interesting.'”