How to Spot Quality within Web Design: Examples & Tips
wefunction.com
wefunction.com
In the end, detail to what converts users matters, not typography or richness of color.
1. Spacing
2. Pixel Perfect Detail
3. Well thought out Typography
4. Organization of Elements
5. Restraint and Subtlety
6. Using Color to its Full Potential
7. Doing something Nobody else has done
Considering the content of each of the points, I would argue that at worst only 2 and 7 focus on form over function. If you're a person that has a hard time telling if a design is good or not this is a great list.
Also, design must start somewhere. You cannot A/B test starting from a blank page.
this anti-reddit fervor that has been developing over the last few months seems to have converted itself into a "no fun allowed" atmosphere, and that just plain sucks. that is not how a community works.
I didn't downvote you. I just want to let you know how people vote on this site. People also appreciate capitalization.
what i wrote was not present in the parent post. this article literally made me go back and check, revamp, and do mild redesigns to almost every site that i have control over. this is statement of fact that i tried to express in an apparently disagreeable manner in my op.
No thanks. We've had enough of that over the last decade.
Moving completely away from grid systems to have something different probably needs more talent in the design department and can not be achieved by anybody.
It seems there is a lot of misunderstanding, grid systems are an invisible structure for laying out content with some consistency. Every newspaper, magazine, book or poster you see is usually designed to a grid of some description.
What we're seeing at the moment is a lot of web design taking the idea of the grid very literally, applying it in a very self conscious way, treating the grid as an aesthetic afterthought rather than as a functional underlying system.
To me, it feels like it's the result of learning the domain backwards, where you have a finished product and then learn about how it's usually done, so you correct here and there some aspects. And it shows.
To be honest, I'm saying that without knowing either how to properly use grids. As many others, I have seen many descriptions of it and how, for some designers, it's the ultimate thing and for others, a tool that they don't want to stick to (e.g. as presented in the documentary Helvetica.)
In the end, do you feel that it's better or worse that people with no "proper" design background apply the grid systems "too much" rather than not paying attention to it at all? I believe that it's good that that kind of knowledge gets spread out, even it misused at first.
But then I realized that it might not be a joke. Designing in a grid system does remind me of "Girders and Panels".
I really have no idea what you're suggesting with "We've had enough of that over the last decade". This isn't all or nothing; you can have gorgeous design with worthwhile content and functionality.