Is your website feeling a little stale? Read up on these innovative web design trends and implement them into your company’s website!
As 2019 has unfolded, so have many unique design trends. If you’re ready for a new website design or refresh, but are stumped on how to move forward, here are some of the most prevalent and innovative web design trends of this year!
It’s an exciting year because these trends are both varied and eye-catching. This year seems to be all about capturing a viewer’s attention through unexpected design elements.
1. Organic Design Elements
We commonly see grids and sharp geometric shapes in web design, but designers are now turning more towards natural, organic shapes. Transparency between customer and brand is becoming more and more important with our social media landscape, and these organic shapes help bring feelings of warmth, comfort, and accessibility.
The inherent imperfect, asymmetrical element of organic shapes is also an easy way to add depth to a web page through spontaneity. Elements and content in the design stand out more simply by being surprising and dynamic and giving the illusion of movement.
2. More Video Content
As our devices and web browsers become more able to handle video, video content has consequently grown. Viewers are used to scanning through Facebook or YouTube and gleaning bits of information through auto-playing video, and this trend capitalizes on this new habit.
Moreover, Google’s new move towards mixed media page results, with video content featured above standard web pages, has led websites to take advantage of this. By featuring quality video content, websites become more searchable, and the chance of shareable content going viral and millions of new eyes on their site is too good to pass up!
3. Vibrant Colors
2019 isn’t shying away from a vibrant color palette. Pantone named Living Coral as the color of the year.
Rich, vibrant color that captures the eye is showing up in animations, backgrounds, fonts, and image overlays. If you want a simple way to refresh your website and give it a modern, up to date look, change up the main colors of your website to more vibrant ones.
4. Minimalist Design
Beyond 2019, minimalist design is a design trend that is both classic and timeless. With fewer design elements on a page, the easier it is for a viewer to navigate to the parts that are important.
White space around content allows the page to breathe. Through the contrast of color, shape, and typography against this white space, viewers are granted a pleasant experience as they can easily navigate a web page.
Web designers will also be able to utilize more white space in their designs through animations and fade-in effects.
5. More Gradients
Gradients are rising in popularity this year because they work with any kind of design. While in 2018 they were mainly used for photo overlays, much like the draw towards vibrant colors, gradients are finding a place to stand on their own.
For projects that are lacking in art, gradients add a fun pop of color to design patterns. Moreover, gradients can be used to highlight certain content on a web page by being used as a background, such as for text or an image.
6. Vintage/Retro Typography
Vintage and retro typography is now rising to the top. Serif typefaces with rounded slabs are used prevalently in headers and callouts, adding bold vintage flair to a web page.
They work as a nice contrast to the vibrant colors and minimalist design trends. These bold typefaces also add a certain amount of gravitas for a brand that communicates trust and longevity.
One of the main reasons for this switch to bolder and retro typography is the improved screen resolutions across devices. The prevailing thought for years was that sans serif fonts are far easier on the eyes when it came to reading on screens. With higher resolution screens, this is no longer an issue.
7. Split Screen Design
The split-screen aesthetic is when a web page is split into two panels of content on desktops and collapses into one column of content on mobile devices. It’s an eye-catching and approachable way to showcase content while still keeping the design mobile-friendly.
8. Diversity & Accessibility
2019 is all about inclusiveness because web designers and our society at large is wising up.
The internet connects billions of people around the planet: people of different ages, gender identities, cultures, and abilities. Web designers are becoming more aware of this – a small example is Apple’s varying skin tones for their emojis.
Larger leaps are expected to be taken, such as making web pages more accessible to blind, visually impaired, deaf, disabled, and dyslexic visitors. This also includes imagery, animations, and photographs of people of all colors and body types so that the slender white male and female are no longer the default humans that represent consumers.
9. Typography Experimentation
Much like the shift towards bold vintage typography, there is far more experimentation with typography in general. Improved resolution across devices allows graphic designers to play with different font combinations in order to grab a viewer’s attention.
One popular design trend with text is to double or stripe stack a headline on the homepage. The oversized font immediately draws the eye, and you have more room to communicate your unique message.
Innovative Web Design For You
Hopefully by now, you’ve gotten at least one or two ideas on how the web design trends of this year can help boost your website to new levels. Innovative web design is all about staying up to date on current trends, but also ensuring that they work with your particular brand and aesthetic.
Ready to see how a group of dedicated professionals can implement these trends into your own site? Contact us today for a free consultation!