Nothing is permanent except change, and the web design and development sector is always in a state of flux. Each year the web design industry goes through an evolution of sorts with trends and influences that are both relevant and inspiring. Some changes take root and transform the way websites are designed forever, while some are just impractical, passing fads. Of late, it is UX that influences some of these trends and consequently the way applications and websites are developed. As users expect more personalized, relevant and interactive experiences from their online engagement, the benchmark is always set very high. Often custom dot net web development solutions work very well because they allow you great freedom in design and development. Building a modern interface that both pleases the user aesthetically and meets their information requirement is to find the right balance between content and design. The buzz this year is around bolder designs, immersive layouts and storytelling to a large extent. Let’s explore the essential web design and development trends for 2017 that will shape the future direction. 1. End Of Flat Design:
Flat design had emerged as a minimalist revolt to skeuomorphism which was really popular back in the day. Flat design focuses on usability, serving user needs and decluttering. However, the real challenge and struggle with flat design principles is that most websites end up looking the same, and delivering the same user experience and journey. Flat design can also be very limiting and stifling for designers and also creates a somewhat uninspiring user experience. Web design has begun to break free from ‘flatness’ in 2016 to a more creative and daring palette. 2017 may well be the year for bigger, bolder design and for ‘anything can happen’ type of creativity. 2. Greater Diversity & Asymmetry: Designers will opt for more diverse, bold and asymmetric patterns in their designs. Websites will have a more dynamic composition with geometrical look and intersecting diagonal lines. If you observe closely, this trend has already made way and we see the usage of photos that are geometric heavy, or overall site designs that rely heavily on lines and patterns. 3. Better Design-To-Development Workflows: Designers have it easier now with more sophisticated web design and prototyping tools. Dynamic visualization enables developers to create more real prototypes that shorten the feedback loop and fully functional and design and prototyping tools to improve the workflow. 4. Animation & GIFs: Interactivity and user engagement have become the guiding principles for design. As a result animation is being used more prominently on websites and it is often the best way to show how something works, how to do something or engage the user visually. The GIFs and animations used are now much more refined and use SVG and CSS to achieve the desired impact. 5. Creative Typography: Typography for the web earlier was quite restrictive and ended up using elements of the same font family and type. Web pages were dominated by simple neo-grotesque styles like Helvetica, Roboto, Lato, or Open Sans. Serif type fonts were best avoided then. But this is now changing as typography breaks away from the norm. Designers have begun using bolder, creative typefaces. There is an interesting contrast of the serif types with the non-serif ones. There is also more animated text with a variety of effects, images and colours. Texts are animated, broken down into individual letters, a variety of effects, images, and videos are placed on them. Large typography is being used on the key visual to make a statement. Final Thoughts As web designing tools and software evolve and user experience and expectations become more sophisticated, there is an evident impact on the overall look and feel and accessibility of websites. Not all trends are here to stay, but some set the tone for future design. What trends do you foresee to have that impact? Do let us know in the comments section. |
Archives
December 2017
Categories
All
|