Web Design Simplicity in 2010 – UX/UI Design

Posted by Alius Designs on Jul 5, 2010 in Blog | 0 comments

The new year has began and has gives us a new page to start off with – to improve ourselves. Looking back at previous years of designing, I see that we as designers gave in to our clients’ requests – cluttering their website with different features that no one needs and thus duplicating content sometimes. In 2009, I started noticing that a lot of shifting in web design started happening, lots of new trends – one of my favorite ones is simplified websites – that got me to thinking: has web user evolved as the web designer has? I hope that in 2010, we’ll see the trend of simplicity continuing and evolving more.

Clear and Light Web Design

I believe that one of the purposes of the designer is to keep information in order and presentable. As internet evolves, it is a responsibility of a designer to do so. Keep information organized and easier for the visitor/user to get to – easily identified and with less clicking. There are numerous websites spring up everyday with some kind of information that someone is looking for – visiting user’s attention span is getting smaller and smaller if website doesn’t grab the attention and lure the user further into the website. As a web designer, one needs to engage with the user and deliver information efficiently, straight to the point. Now, when I speak of simplifying a web design, I do not mean to do away with functionality and access to vital information to the visitor. As a designer, one has to think of a new way to create a new user experience by employing available tools at one’s disposal. I’ll give you an example that I see all over the new mobile phones – roller ball/button, one controls everything, i.e. iPhone, Nexus or Blackberries.

One Page Website

Another interesting trend that I’ve noticed that has grown over the past year is one page websites. There’s so much new technology available for web designer today, it’s very interesting to see what they can come up with. A single page website can, at times, deliver more information than a multi-page website. It’s like a homepage is the main navigation to all of the content from the website. If you don’t have much of content to put up, you can provide pages of information without clicking off the page. Single page web design, as some designers use tabs, java scripts, modal boxes, sliders and toolbars to give more information in a single page. Single page websites can be easily managed, and a designer can think outside of the box when designing them.

Content and Image Slider

Here’s another trend that’s upcoming – I keep seeing many websites using image sliders with various JavaScript frameworks as a featured content slider or image content slider for the portfolio to showcase their work or on a homepage to deliver information right away. By using sliders, it actually gives visitors a better impact and clear overview about the site. Plus, comparing to flash image sliders, JavaScript loads faster and it is search engine friendly. On top of that, you are increasing user experience.

Modal Boxes

Taking user deeper and deeper into your site will make user lose interest. Maybe you don’t want user leaving from a certain page on your website. Why load a video or contact form on a separate page? I’ve used a few CRM, like SugarCRM and vTiger systems lately and noticed that modal boxes appear there also. Modal boxes can be used for almost anything – login or signup forms, contact forms, lead generation, and etc.

Page Layouts going BIG

Today, a lot of web users don’t just use 15″ monitors anymore, monitor sizes have increased over the past few years to 20″-30″. What does that mean for a designer? More room, real estate to play around with for page layout. Now with that said, doesn’t mean that we need to cram up every bit of that space with something unnecessary, doesnt’ mean to clutter web page. It just gives desigenr a bit more room to present information more efficiently.

Use of Type Visually

Utilizing typography in today’s web design trend is growing rapidly. Large and bold text carries message clearly, at times, better than imagery itself.

Tweaker

Some websites utilize what I like to call “tweaker”. It increases user experience exponentially in my opinion. I think this would work great for sites like NewEgg. This trend is there, but very slowly picking up.

So, I think I’ve covered some of the main points that I can think of at the moment. Hopefully these trends, elements will grow even more in 2010 and we should see some exciting works in the future.