At the beginning of the rebellious 1970s, instructors at Stuttgart Art Academy tried out experimental forms of teaching, challenging the role of the designer. A group of reformist instructors founded the Institut für angewandte Sozialökologie (Institute for Applied Social Ecology) which, among other goals, had the aim of analysing and further developing the functional uses of consumer products. In order to gain experience in the business world and to become financially independent, they opened a backyard store: Magazin. Its founders, including designer and long-time manager Otto Sudrow, were committed to the tradition of classical Modernism they knew from the Academy. As was the case with the design critics of the early 20th century, this was a project for general enlightenment: Common sense was to enter the home in a modern variety of “lifestyle reform”. To this very day, the project, which originally derived from political economy and the founders’ criticism of product aesthetics, remains unique. Magazin’s product range was to consist of existing capital goods, because they guarantee the utmost in quality at the lowest price. They discovered what they were looking for at industrial fairs and in catalogues. The first products on offer included work lamps, lab chinaware, restaurant glassware, butchers’ knives, untreated muslin for filtering processes, factory shelves, postmen’s bags and metal pails – things they turned into useful consumer goods. The store’s owners also came up with products of their own. After the first catalogue appeared in 1980 printed on grey recycled paper, Magazin rapidly expanded to become a nationwide furniture store with a significantly increased range of supplies. Today, there are the stores in Stuttgart and in Bonn. Magazin joined arms with the mail order firm Manufactum in 2001, a move that opened up totally new perspectives. In the meantime, Magazin offers a comprehensive choice of goods for nearly all areas of home furnishing and decoration. But the rationalist ideas of the founding era are still evident today in the matter- offact tone of all articles and explanatory texts. The number of Magazin’s novel creations, soon to include a table series by Axel Kufus, has increased considerably. To name just a few: the multipurpose MDF sofa bed (by Michael Mettler) or the numberless radio-controlled wall clock. The program’s intellectual background remains evident in the fact that shelves reappear time and again. Some of the new innovative products in this exciting line include Mein_Back (by Hannes Bäuerle, Claudia Miller and Alexander Seifried) – constructed from transpor boxes – and 1hoch3 (by Dominik Lutz), a connector system using only one component.