Brand New!
Posted 6 months agoOver the course of 15 months, I’ve redesigned my site’s theme over a dozen times, but for ever major iteration, it’d be a number no higher than six. If you’ve been reading my blog ever since the very inception of it, then you would have at least felt annoyed about why I can’t seem to settle, or choose a design I finally seem to like.
But it is really hard to settle when everything else is evolving, changing and reiterating around you. No, I’m not talking about the winds of change. I’m talking about the web. The web evolves very quickly. If you were able to look at sites between two years ago and today, you can see how fast, and gradual, the web can change.
Though, that doesn’t mean I’ll be redesigning my site every single minute of every day. I just meant that from what I have learned from an evolving web, I learnt that my design has to evolve as well.
On The Design
I was reading Time Magazine the other week, and I saw and realised how much better the reading experience is on a magazine rather than on the web. In this case, Time Magazine’s articles were a joy to read, as there was beautifully aligned text and typography, vibrant colors for each and every article, and wonderful, huge, high-quality photos on full-width pages and articles.
Pull sections like these are also in Time Magazine.
They give readers a chance to take a break from reading the article, and it provides some sort of entertainment with small snippets of info related to the article.
I wanted something like this too, but hacking the style on top of my last theme was going to be a pain.
That was when I decided to start from scratch. You know, just a text-editor and white, blank webpage. I cleared off my workspace, just to get in the zone. The only things that were open in my screen, were Jason Santa Maria’s article on typography, and Trent Walton’s article on Trimming the Fat.
Now, what you see here, is the culmination of most of all of my experiences on web design, and countless hours of work.
Art Direction
Another classic feature Time Magazine has, is that most of all their articles are uniquely designed, or rather, they have their own sort of, unique, personality. Blogs like Trent Walton’s and Jason Santa Maria’s uses Art Direction (and boy, they look great) and because their blogs were open up on my screen, their sites reminded me of how wonderful Art Direction on the web really is.
Trent Walton’s article on workspaces:
The style is amazing. It’s got that do-it-yourself workbench appeal, and the ‘loose’ hanging lettering is a nice touch as well.
Of course, I haven’t implemented some classy Art Direction on this here post, but soon, not to soon, but soon, you’ll see how I’ll implement some Art Direction on my blog.
On Platforms and Gratitude
I love Tumblr. It is, literally, the easiest way to blog, and it even says so on their home page. Not only is it smooth and easy to use, but it is, not in its entirety though, flexible. (It’s hard to explain, but I’d call it flexible, but with restrictions.) I would like to switch to WordPress someday, though, I have blogged once before using so, and I found that it is a pain to create, at least, a simple WordPress theme.
Did you know?
I once designed a Tumblr theme or two. If you’re planning to start up a blog on Tumblr, at least, if you already have a Tumblr blog, why not try and test the themes I’ve made over at the Tumblr theme garden.
Also, if it weren’t for my favorite web designers; Jason Santa Maria, Trent Walton, Tim Van Damme and Maykel Loomans, and their blogs, I wouldn’t have found complete inspiration, and I’d be searching through countless pages on Dribbble, looking for unique and minimal blog designs, and if it weren’t for them and their blogs, I would have stuck to my very first blog theme; a theme that I didn’t even make myself.
So, I sure do hope you enjoy the new look. If you find any bugs, please, take a look at my colophon for details on how to contact me, and I’ll squash those darn bugs.
P.S. The site’s responsive.