The web designers have taken their inspiration from the “greats” of the web such as Apple, Microsoft and Google. With “Material design” Google invites us to follow its advice on web design, starting with its latest restyling of the graphic interfaces. Google and its components (Gmail, Drive, Google+ etc.) are among the most used in the world, so how could we ignore, in terms of usability, the graphic design proposal that Google offers us on a silver platter? Surely not everyone will grasp these new proposals of a material design, tactile and marked for the most part to the mobile world. Flat Design and Modern UI have represented for a decade the trends to imitate, Material Design is proposed as the future of web design, but there are other factors to be inspired by.
Let’s start from the central theme, where all other ideas and initiatives will converge: mobile. Today it is not possible to create a web page without considering the visibility on smartphones etc.. Responsive design has been talked about a lot in recent years, but it still happens to come across websites (often programmed in flash) difficult to view. So the most important thing is to think about how you will see the site on your smartphone and what features, such as slideshows, complicated animations we can sacrifice for usability. With this I do not mean to delete slides, galleries and similar but not to make them visible in the mobile version (display none) or to program alternatives so as not to lose the content.
The hamburger menu, for instance, is the three-line key that indicates the navigation menu. It is usually found at the top left of the mobile displays. The novelty is in designing the hamburger menu also for the desktop version in place of the usual horizontal menu with subcategories. In reality, the fixed and intrusive menus, central to navigation, will gradually disappear, as already mentioned to make mobile solutions easier. In addition to the type of hamburger menu there will be room for new solutions such as curtains (from the right or left) that will appear through the action of the user. You need to guide the viewer, this could be achieved with the help of buttons located in the right places and of course the arrow key that quickly returns to the top of the page.
The suspended blocks of the Pinterest bulletin board are an excellent example to be repeated in the pages of websites. A new trend in web design 2017 will be based on a “waterfall” box layout; known in jargon as “Masonry” or “Grid layout”. In a nutshell, these are content boxes (of different formats) suspended at a certain distance with a light background tending to gray in order to create an effect of spatiality. The contents that detach from the bottom are a feature of Google’s material design, while the boxes of different formats or better, that adapt to the content are the feature of the notice board of Pinterest. If we add search filters we have a fresh, dynamic and responsive website.
The images will always have a central role and depending on the type of sector you will decide whether to opt for the classic slideshow or a dynamic solution of motion images. In any case it is important to make an accurate selection avoiding to insert the standard images. In addition to bore the user, they also make the site heavy. The video will have more and more space within the websites, to explain a process, attract the user or present a product. The video is not yet widely used. It’s more complicated than taking a picture and requires a post production service, a short script and conception. An alternative to these mini advertising videos are the stop motion presentations even at 360 degrees. The key word is to be dynamic, innovative, and interested. Infographics too are always very appreciated.
One page websites have been used for several years and thanks to the feature of having all the information on one page, they are the answer to the needs of users. A fast, practical and dynamic vision and the possibility to create effects and animations using the parallax composition. A one page website is, as the name suggests, a website developed on a single page; it is usually navigable through the use of a menu, as happens in normal sites. But instead of opening new pages it will “scroll down”. All in one and immediately is an excellent solution to present the characteristics of a product, tell the story of a company (storytelling), or deepen a content using the verticality. The one page structure is widely used for presentation purposes.
This is a summary of what awaits us in 2017 in the field of web design:
– the mobile will be more and more protagonist
– make the users life easy by organizing content in the best possible way
– adopt a universal language extrapolating the best from the greats of the web (Google, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft etc.)
– try to give space to videos and infographics
– simplify and at the same time characterize
– innovation and dynamism but without neglecting usability
– provide a unique service to customers and their users
IG-Global is an advertising agency in South Tyrol that deals with website creation, web marketing, advertising graphics, online shops, SEO strategies for search engine optimization. Our company does design applications, advertising printing, text editing and translations. We are constantly updated on the latest news, to guarantee the best for our customers.
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