Decoration - the Enemy of Good Web Design

Completely agree. Just decorators are also not artists. They are just decorators.

Reading tip: Adolf Loos – “Ornament and crime”

@Robert

You’re absolutely right, decorators aren’t artists, and neither decorators nor artists are designers.

And thanks for the tip, consider it on my reading list.

Is it me or people are just posting weird comments?

I think it’s very hard to find the happy medium between all – the only way to really know for sure is to test it with a/b split tests.

@Joe

Yes, there were some strange comments there. We’ve removed them now since it was all spam.

Re: a/b split tests, I wholeheartedly agree. You should always test. However, sometimes you need to make a decision before having any concrete data, and in those cases I think decoration is something to steers away from.

Lol,

“Add an image to their design if it doesn’t serve a very well thought out purpose. Irrelevant stock photos with the sole purpose of “living up the design” come from clueless CEOs.”

I have to admit, I do this once in a while, but sometimes I have to put something there to get the ball rolling or a client will have no clue what to put there. Even putting in bad content helps get the client to help out. Bad content is better than no content, but not the “Lorem ipsum” type, lol. Keep up these blog posts, very original, as I’m sick of people like myself putting up garbage!

It seems ridiculous to me to label people as “designer”, “artist”, “decorator”, etc.

There are artistic facets to design, just as design is frequently boring without some elements of a decorative eye or mindset. They are complementary skill sets, not competing ones.

Labeling roles, like this, serves no real purpose. It doesn’t move poor, or even just ok, web design to better web design.

The crux of the issue is whether the individual or team creating the site has a solid understanding of their intended audience or not and whether they have a correlating concept of what that audience finds appealing and motivates them to purchase, browse, or share (depending on the goal the site is trying to achieve).

Certainly there are principles to good web design and those should be shared, as you’re attempting to do here.

I don’t disagree with most of the principles you’ve catalogued. Though in larger companies, lorem ipsum has it’s place, since text and layout are frequently not done at the same time or by the same people. Those who are very good with visual mediums are not always equally adept with language and vice versa.

Anyone who creates a web site is a “real” web designer. The question you should be posing is whether they are a “good” web designer. The act of creation or development proves technical aptitude but it doesn’t indicate any inherent quality.

Just as I would say, you are a “real” writer but not necessarily a “good” one. ;o

BTW – there is a typo in one of your bolded sentences: This kind of meaningless beauty will only server as a distraction to your customers.

Its absolutely right. Most of the user expecting decoration. they dont bother about application features.

In your website, visual elements, the content, etc. works together to tell a story. It may say “You are safe with us” or “This is a place to be creative” or “This is a competitive place, put your gloves on”, etc. In my mind you need to be both an artist and a designer to make a web site really stand out.

This article is wrong in every single way. Decoration is a powerful aesthetic tool, and in the hands of the right designer it will enhance and improve presentation.

Furthermore, ‘lorem ipsum’ is used by designers the world over to block in text.

The author of the article is clearly not a professional.

I totally agree with you concerning the abuse of decoratin in design it kill more than add beauty to the website ! good job Jamie !