Allchorn Design

Being the fact that I am in the website design industry, this post relates first and foremost to that specific line of design, but some parallels can surely be drawn with other forms of design.

First and foremost, my favourite saying is:

“Design is not about making things pretty, but rather about making things work.”

I don’t know who first said that, but in my experience, it is the truth, and cannot be refuted ever. Even if your objective is to drive away sales (I don’t know why you’d do this), then if you designed with that purpose in mind, and it works, then well… it worked. Your design worked!

Content, Structure & Communication

I believe that designing websites should be focussed around your content. Creating content to suit your pre-imposed design is working backwards and counter productive.

Think about the message you are trying to portray. Yes, that is communication. Be it communication to the masses, communication to a small group of people, or even communication to one person; you are communicating.

Does your message come across clearly in a no-frills format? Can people readily and easily pick up on what you’re trying to say without a background image and frilly edges? If not, then your foundation for the design to come is made of squidgy, non-drying mud.

Think beyond aesthetics (the concept of beauty) and come back to “designing” your message. Be that in the form of visuals (either created or photographed visuals) and your all important copy (textual content).

Think what your prospective customer would need to instantly recognise your offering.

Designing a website also involves the choice of structure, be it a static site, one powered by a CMS or something else. You need to carry out the wireframing of the layout to achieve the best usability for your visitors as well as determining how things must work and the users will interact. Often this is an evolutionary process, and one which cannot be pre-determined.

The Finishing Process

Applying the visual finishing touches to a website in my eyes is a step -contrary to my calling it the finishing process- that can come in the middle or end, or even the beginning of the project.

Normally I don’t promote nor condone the design being number 1 on the list, but sometimes a project is visual design only, with little or no back end considerations. In this case, go ahead.

If your project requires more than one page, and perhaps some on-page changes like dynamic navigation etc, the number of design mockups would likely need to be in the hundreds if you wanted to show every conceiable state of the site.

In Conclusion

To sum up what my view is of design, is that it is a process in which frills are just icing on the cake. Placing all emphasis on how things look is incorrect thinking should you wish to have a resulting website that performs. Get your foundations right and then start doing some window dressing.