I’m liking the type on this album cover for the band Elephant Micah. I don’t know anything about the band except what I can read here in this KEXP blog post, but I would be very tempted to pick this album up based on its cover.
Great Website: Tractor Supply Company
I really like the Tractor Supply Company website for a few reasons. They have a website as straightforward to use as their company name. TSC is an excellent example of keeping a website simple while still carrying through a consistent graphic design theme.
Color Palette
The TSC website makes great use of a richly muted multi-color palette that ranges from burnt oranges and yellows to cooler blues. It’s all held together with a neutral colored brown sugar background.
Clean Layout
Though there is much to display on a e-commerce site like TSC the designers are careful to keep things airy. Each box that appears on the homepage is given enough white space to let the page breathe and never look overwhelming.
Appropriate Type
Headlines, titles and lists all have proportionally scaled type.
Flash Elements
Most sites can benefit from Flash when it’s used correctly. While in the past, many sites overused the medium by creating entire sites in it, it has now become something much more subtle adding an element of fluidity to pages and sites on the web. Just remember when creating a flash element for a site that the flash itself does not contribute to SEO in any way. Do use JavaScript to make sure your flash works for various devices and browsers.
Intrasite Link Reiteration
TSC uses a very user-centered approach to linking to their product and department pages from the homepage. Reiteration of links throughout the page serve as more arrows to guide the visitor through pages of products.
Top Search Box and Store Locator
I can’t tell you how exhausting it is as a visitor to try to find some search boxes and store location lists on different sites. Searches and store locations should be in an easy to find location, preferably at the top of a given page. TSC does a great job of putting these two items in an upper location that saves the user from hunting it down.
It’s websites like TSC that take the concept of great user centered website design and make it a functioning reality. I am sure they get many more completed sales from their site and fewer questions about how to find this or that product.
How Big Is Your Footer?
An interesting discussion about detailed footers came up in an IXDA discussion. While this site’s footer is just a single line I have toyed with the idea of expanding the area with useful information. If nothing more than to reiterate site navigation and add a bit of interest to the lower third of the page.
Here are some nice-looking detailed footers from around the web.
If the detailed footer solution makes sense for future projects I will definitely use it.
Locavores
In addition to being a web designer I am also an environmental enthusiast. I count hiking and farmer’s markets among my favorite activities. While doing some research on local bloggers I came across a blog called 100 Mile Harvest kept by a family in Sugar Land who have challenged themselves to eat locally for a year.
Here they are being all inspiring like on the CBS Early Show.
Brazoria County Bloggers Roll Call
Where are my Brazoria County bloggers at? We seem to be few and far between, but it shouldn’t be that way. If you find me let me know you’re out there blogging to represent the B-Z-A (short for Brazoria County)!
I know there’s…
Laurie Heath Studio
TDECU
The Brazosport News
The Lake Jackson Democrat
Anyone else?
Good Websites vs. Bad Websites
There is a such thing as a good website and a bad website and it’s not just about looks! A good website is a valuable tool for growing your business. A good website will help you meet your business goals.
And you can bet that a website like Electra Bikes didn’t happen by the business owner getting their daughter’s best friend’s uncle to slap something together. Nor did it happen by paying a web hosting company $10 a month. Nor did it happen by purchasing a website template.
Templates and daughter’s best friend’s uncles have their place in the life cycle of a website, but these types of web designers are not likely to systematically grow your business. For that you have to hire a professional and sure that takes a bit of research and trust, but it stands the biggest pay off in the long run.
So while a good website displays fresh design, integrates into your company’s goals and contributes to your bottom line, a bad website can’t. A bad website just sits there on the net waiting for someone to happen by– hoping whoever may discover it might rake together some bits of information before they close the browser window.
Only you as a business owner or project lead can say for sure what solution your company needs right now. Take into consideration what is best and act on it with the end in mind.
Twitter In Plain English Video
This video explains why Twitter exists. In case you were wondering. (via)
Blog Design Patterns
Over the years I’ve discovered many design banks, places on the internet that collect and showcase design features. The Web 1.0 way of cataloging these sites was to label them the best-, the techiest-, the most beautiful designs. While that’s fascinating on a quarterly or semi-annual scale, it doesn’t do me much good as a designer on a day to day basis. For that I need design patterns.
Design pattern libraries offer up examples of how designers solve common challenges (very Web 2.0). I visit design libraries at least once per project to see if there’s a standard practice before I go off trying to reinvent the wheel.
As for designing for this blog I didn’t need to know how an entire blog was designed since this blog looks much like the rest of the site design. I did, however, want to know how to style the blog posts here (which is what you’re reading right now, my friend). That’s where a blog design pattern library like Design Meltdown comes in handy.
Design Meltdown covers a lot of design challenges from design elements that incorporate fabric, price tags and iPhones to design themes that use spray can drips and splatters.
Even if the websites featured on the site might not always exemplify spectacular web design, it’s really not about that for me. It’s really about giving a community of designers a handful of guidelines in a space of infinite solutions. Since discovering these design pattern libraries I don’t know how I survived without them before!
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