You want your website to be a part of this list and not this one. Before you throw away your money on hiring an amazing designer, it’s important to figure out what you want your website to look like. Take the initiative in creating your own look. A website designer is like your personal stylist, 99% of the time you don’t need one to help you define who you are and what you want out of your site, but they sure can help make it look good. Here are a couple of style tips for your website (and for your personal wardrobe), that you should follow in order to stand out from the billions of other websites and people.
Make it clean
The fashion industry and web design are stylistically similar at this moment in time. As with fashion, you want your site to be clean. Figure out the structure of your site and keep it as clean and simple as possible. Unless you want your website to look like this, stick to the basics. Make your website flow from top to bottom with a sense of start and finish. Just like your complete look before you go out on a date, your website needs to have one as well. Your website’s stylesheet is your personal lookbook. Keep it nice and structured to allow for change if needed. Your site’s JavaScript is your personal accessory – just like a nice watch, your JavaScript shouldn’t be throwing itself into the user’s face (Flash style), rather it should help the user have a more pleasant experience interacting with your website.
Make use of the basics
Just like your closet basics (white t-shirts), make sure to suit up your website with some basics of itself. Have a nice, clean header and footer. Contrast the background color with your navigation for the user experience to be easy and visually appealing. A lot of websites use huge background images for their front page. Try to minimize the use of those and stick to minimal backgrounds. This will load your site faster as well, since you’re not pulling huge images when a user tries to access your site. Here is a good colour palette for you to use, if you want to stay away from the tacky ’04 color schemes.
Be unique
At the end of the day, your website reflects your brand and yourself, so build it as you would your own look. Don’t just copy others style guides, take inspiration from websites/people you look up to, and create your own style path. Don’t be one of those people that live on tumblr and are only willing to dress like other #ootd’s, be a trendsetter, not a trend follower, with your personal style, and your website.
How do you like Spark’s style? Would you go on a date with us? Let us know below or give us a shout!
