Changes in The Spokesman-Review go in front of their most important audience next week: local readers in Washington and Idaho.

The reader meetings will be the first chance that news consumers have to evaluate the paper's new size, typography and changes in content (see above left for the current paper and right for the changed paper). The examples above are from just one prototype readers will see and the front page represented above is from a major breaking news day; routine news days will also be put in front of readers.

The central san-serif headline font is Guggenheim Condensed, created by Jonathan Hoefler for the Guggenheim museums. The secondary sans is Whitney, used everywhere in the weekend magazine, 7, and displayed here as an accent font in promotion, graphics and other small-type usages. The main serif face is Chronicle Condensed, a brand-new H&F-J face with much versatility. The paper makes wide use of all families.

MG partner Scott Goldman will be in Spokane to assist Geoff Pinnock with the focus groups from Nov. 14-16. Goldman and Pinnock will be asking readers to score the paper on ease of use, readability and innovation, with MG using the research to drive final choices for implementation.

Matt Mansfield and Denise Reagan will visit Spokane Nov. 30-Dec. 3 for another round of revisions on the overall newspaper, as well as a check-in on the work already in print in the new Home and 7 sections, which debuted their redesigns ahead of the overall newspaper.

All current prototype pages were designed by Pinnock and Ralph Walter, the Spokesman's assistant design director, in consultation with MG's creative team. This prototype, the third such iteration, was the first time that S-R designers began working with the paper's new typography, story forms and the change to a 50-inch web size.

(Complete aside: Ralph's brother, Jess Walter, may be the best person to give you a glimpse of life in the Inland Northwest. Jess has written several books, most set in Spokane. "Land of the Blind" and "Citizen Vince" are both richly textured novels worth reading.)