Web Design Trends for 2014
It’s a new year and we’re ready to embrace some of the latest movements in the industry. Last year we noticed an overwhelming acceptance for the multitude of devices now on offer and 2014 definitely boasts increased awareness of this. Check out Pipe & Piper’s “ones to watch” for 2014 below:
1. Flat Design
Apple
Web design has often grown in complexity over the years and while this will continue to be the case we will notice almost a step back in terms of UX. The “Flat Design” most commonly noticed in the new release of apple’s iOS 7. Everything has been stripped back to basics; removal of drop shadows, 3d gradients and much more. While not everyone has adopted this approach, what happens more often than not is when apple deliver a new design other designers within the marketplace follow suit. If you need an apple app specialist in Sheffield get in touch today.
Another big name you will instantly recognise is Twitter’s new flat approach, they, like apple have reversed ideas on design. These new design ideologies remove any reminiscence of a “web 2.0” feel. By removing the shiny icons and navigation bars we are left with solid colours and more icons.
2. Dropping the Sidebar & Adding the Reveal Bar
For many years we’ve been getting used to lot’s of websites offering sidebar which give you extra navigation links, now with increasing demand for less cluttered interfaces they are becoming increasingly hidden from view. Now it’s extremely important to know what type of device your user is using so you can provide them with an appropriate interface, whether it’s touch, tap, slide or click. By hiding the the sidebar it allows the designer to create a design with more impact to the user.
3. Less Text
Don’t worry “content is still king“! However we’re seeing more and more websites utilise the homepage as a large splash screen. With little text, more full screen images & extenuated sexy typography becoming more prominent. We live in a world of constant information and we are now seeing designs which harness all this information and present it to you in bite-size chunks. Websites now portray a story to the user rather than presenting them with information overload, they take you on a journey
4. Hero Areas
These are the are the large banners that take the whole focus of the website, they normally appear on the homepage. This technique is becoming increasingly evident and will continue to shape design of websites throughout the rest of the year. These banners also tie in nicely with the trends 1) flat design and 3) less text. These areas will be bold and sometimes adventurous, there aims are to grip your attention.
5. Mobile First Approach
While designing for mobiles and tablets is nothing new, however we will be seeing more websites totally focus around smart devices first then build the desktop version on top of this model. We’re seeing complexity stripped from initial prototypes and extra functionality from the desktop sites added a later date in the development process. The reason for this increased approach is the fact that smartphones and tablets are gaining huge market share. Google developers have implemented this ideas for a few years and finally we are seeing the marketplace being persuaded.
Potential Trends for 2014…
HTML5 Canvas – For animations & games previously the web used Flash or Java to handle the heaving. However with apples decision to end Adobe Flash’s lifespan and Java’s need to install itself onto the users browser we can expect to see huge numbers of sites using the inbuilt browser technologies to display complex animations.
SVG – Another open source product which will most likely be hitting the headlines this year will be the Scaleable Vector Graphic. These allow images to be stretched with minimal distortion and also allow 3 dimensional shapes, there also great for analysing dynamic data such as numbers to product complex graphs and charts. There are millions of delicious examples of SVGs’ capabilities that are already out there in the marketplace and will only continue to grow.
