Style&Design Spring 2013: Editor’s Desk

If creativity had a season, it would have to be spring: the act of creation, after all, is about bringing something new into the world

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On the cover: Photograph of Tina Fey by Paola Kudacki for Time. Valentino black sheer silk jumpsuit with white collar and cuffs; Bulgari High Jewelry Collection white gold and pavé diamond earrings; H. Stern Celtic Dunes ring in 18-karat noble gold with diamonds
Photograph of Tina Fey by Paola Kudacki for TIME

On the cover: Photograph of Tina Fey by Paola Kudacki for Time. Valentino black sheer silk jumpsuit with white collar and cuffs; Bulgari High Jewelry Collection white gold and pavé diamond earrings; H. Stern Celtic Dunes ring in 18-karat noble gold with diamonds

If creativity had a season, it would have to be spring: the act of creation, after all, is about bringing something new into the world. So it is fitting that in this issue of TIME STYLE & DESIGN we cover the creative spirit in various disciplines, from art to entertainment and, of course, fashion.

Who could doubt the creative genius of our cover subject, Tina Fey? She recently concluded her seventh season producing one of the most innovative (and certainly among the funniest) network television shows in recent memory. Alas, creativity is not always rewarded with popularity: 30 Rock survived thanks more to critical acclaim—it garnered 10 prime-time Emmys, including three for Outstanding Comedy Series—than to its middling ratings.

(COVER: Tina Fey Rocks On)

Fey might well appreciate the absurdist chutzpah of Scandinavian artists Michael Elmgreen and Ingar Dragset, who use the very prominent siting of a statue of a boy on a rocking horse in an effort to deflate the English propensity for self-veneration. “If the staid monuments to British war heroes in London’s Trafalgar Square could talk,” writes London-based journalist William Lee Adams, “they might order the kid on the rocking horse to settle down.”

The up-and-coming generation of creatives has no intention of settling down, of course. In a season in which new faces appeared at the helms of fashion’s most venerable houses—Raf Simons at Dior and Hedi Slimane at the rechristened Saint Laurent Paris—a young designer by the name of Wes Gordon is making waves in New York City, while 28-year-old Spanish chef Sergio Barroso turned the sleepy town of Valparaiso, Chile, into a culinary destination.

And in an example of the scientific link between creativity and longevity, designer Elsa Peretti, 72, just signed a 20-year contract to continue her work with Tiffany. She had plenty of bargaining power: her jewelry and home accessories account for 10% of sales for the $3.6 billion company. In a rare interview, Peretti spoke with fine-jewelry expert and author Marion Fasel about the 1970s (Whips! Cocaine! Halston!), her career and creativity. “By cutting away what I thought was extra in my mind,” she told Fasel in her charming Italian accent, “I arrive sooner to the essentials.”

Easier said than done. But therein lies true creativity.

MORE: Style&Design Spring 2013 Issue