http://www.designdetector.com/demos/css-gradients-demo-3.php
I was wondering if any designers out there could shed some light on whether or not this has any advantages over images.
You ask designers for input but I think it's an engineering choice to use simple and straightforward technologies you (and colleagues) fully understand rather than meddling with neat hacks, particularly if you're deploying out to the user browsers, which is a quagmire even if you're not getting too fancy.
Of course if you're in an environment where images are impossible/banned for whatever reason (and you can't use proper CSS gradients) then this technique could make you look like a magician, but I can't think of such a situation off-hand.