current design trend.

Discussion on the design trend, and your philosophy on web design

[jonlau]

As you all know, the trend of design is constantly evolving, and i am just kind of curious of knowing what you all think about the current design trend is? How would you define what a "professionally designed site" is, and what elements should be in the design?

For me, I am totally into minimalistic design - no gradient, some pictures for logos, and simple shapes for blocks. But sometimes i would feel that my design is not "as effective" comparing to other sites, and it usually takes me a long time to construct a very feasible design.

Thanks.

[gussie]

Check out the CSS Zen Garden. Here's an example

[csszengarden.com ]

These are CSS demonstration sites, but all are designed by professional graphic designers. They make it look so easy.

[tedster]

That page has an intentional side-scroll, difficult to read pale text, and some of the CSS options generate teensy fonts that are both serif AND italic. Not on my watch!

A few months back this particular site was a real gem. Now it looks like the print mindset is running amok.

The trend I see on the web that I think really matters is toward visual simplicity and practical minimalism. Design elements that SUPPORT the communication, rather than distracting the visitor from the content and toward appreciating the aesthetic sense of the artist.

The bottom line for me: when any one element of a website overpowers the others, then someone is showing off -- and no one likes a show-off.

[georgeek]

..I am totally into minimalistic design..

Me too, I have been doing HTMinimaLism for over two years - Since I came across the word for what I was doing already :) in Curt Cloninger's book Fresh Styles for Web Designers.

Minimalist web page design is functionally and aesthetically simple and hence easy to conceptualise and explain to clients. I am only grateful that there are so few of us providing the market! It may be rediscovered by the next generation of designers not least because Jarrod says he is going to bring back the Minimalist Web Project [textbased.com] this year!

..the current design trend is?

If it can be done - do it and look cool.

[Mardi_Gras]

>..I am totally into minimalistic design..

>If it can be done - do it and look cool.

There is a huge range of professional design within these two extremes. "Mimimalist" should be no more a goal of design than "cool."

The goal of design should be to use the tools available to create a functional, interesting site, easily usable by web surfers, that meets the client's goals and needs. Why should a site need to be "minimalist" to achieve those goals any more than being "cool" would help achieve them?

Now, if by minimalist, you mean no more features than needed to meet the design goals (what I believe Tedster is referring to as "practical minimalism"), I would agree. But that is seldom the meaning applied to minimalism in web design in the posts I see here.

[willybfriendly]

usable by web surfers, that meets the client's goals and needs...

All too often these two goals are in direct opposition to each other. Too many clients want the flash and glitter that distracts from the user experience, simply because it looks 'cool'. I am sure that I am not the only one who has spent a lot of time talking clients out of the use of animated gifs, Flash, JS heavy designs, FP wipes and fades and the like.

The trend I see currently is a lot of 3 column designs with stock photography, in-line links contained in a snippet that is supposed to give a brief description of where one is headed, drop down menus, etc.

I usually end up looking for a site map or a site search when I run across these. I don't usually have the time or interest to work my way through all that text to find what I am lookinjg for.

WBF

[too much information]

I am working on making my sites smaller in file size using CSS. It is much easier to edit later, and much faster for my visitors.

The only problem I'm running into is compatibility. Most of the designs at the site above did not display as they were intended on my Mac. (IE 5.5)

I think my trend for coding is more CSS and fewer images, for design it's plain solid color backgrounds (mostly white) and splashes of bright colors in my <div> borders and images.

[Mike_Levin]

The most important trend is the use of search engines to look for products, and how this means any page of your entire website may be the point-of-entry for a potential customer. Minimalist or cool doesn't matter to me. Capturing the prospect does. We all know how little time we have to capture that prospect as they're rampaging through the results looking for what they want.

So, fast-loading is hugely important, but then so is telling the entire story of your organization in a single, simple image on every single page of your website. There should be great consistency from page to page, but the image that makes that consistency should be a quick visual summary of what the company's all about. It's like a tagline, but as a picture. I think of it as tagline 2.0 (for the Web). I think of the process of making sure that this picture is on every page of the site that a prospect might be dropped into (via search engines) as "idiot-proofing" the site.

Idiot-proofed sites should be the new design trend.

[paybacksa]

Goofy people looking sraight up into fisheye lenses with their arms stretched out wide appears to be a current "trend".

I've even seen some actual staff people pose for such images for their company websites (as opposed to buying those CDs full of stock images of goofy people looking sraight up into fisheye lenses with their arms stretched out). I suspect they will regret that move later ;-)

[moltar]

I agree with simplistic designs. Want to add hover links and pixel graphics and little icons.