Originally produced in one room under the Smash Hits offices in Carnaby Street, The Face was first launched in May 1980 in London by Nick Logan, the journalist who had previously been editor of New Musical Express and Smash Hits.
In the autumn of 1979, with Smash Hits‘ circulation at 166,000 copies, Logan proposed a new magazine which was to be “a well-produced, well-designed and well-written monthly with music at its core but with expanding coverage of the subjects that informed it, from fashion and film to nightclubbing and social issues”.
When everyone passed on the proposal, Logan and his wife decided to go it alone and invest £3,500 savings into the new title, which he named The Face.