Design Gallery, Articles & Community

Design Trend: Side Navigation Is Everywhere, but Does It Work?

There’s a trending topic in website design navigation: sidebar menus. More designers are working with vertical side navigation for projects, with a specific location on the left side for many of these website designs.

And while it looks nice and can help streamline clutter in the overall canvas, does it really work? Will users respond to side navigation? Is it a design trend that you should consider? Today, we’ll try to get to the heart of the questions with some practical and usable answers.

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Graphics / 23 May 2017

50+ Best Minimal Logo Design Templates

How much does it cost to design a professional logo? $500? $1,000? Or $5,000? What if we told you that you can get a great-looking minimal logo design for the price of lunch?

The strategy we’re talking about here is to try using a pre-designed logo template to base your next logo mark or branding project on. Will it be as perfectly tailor-made as a high-end custom logo? Probably not. But it’s a great solution for getting your branding project started fast. To show you how amazing these logo templates can be, we picked some of the best minimalist logo designs from Envato Elements.

With some basic Adobe Illustrator or Adobe Photoshop knowledge and a $29 subscription to Envato Elements, you can download any (or all) of these logo templates to design your own creative logo all by yourself. It’s a great, flexible way to experiment with your next logo project!

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Business / 22 May 2017

15 Skills Every Design Client Expects You to Have

While every design project is a little bit different, almost every client expects you to be a jack of all trades to some degree. Regardless of the project, designers are often expected to provide a complete solution for clients, even though most of us don’t have all the same skills.

In addition to design, clients may ask for expertise in marketing, code, or illustration. It can be a difficult balance at times. But knowing what clients might expect can help you have a plan for how to deal with specific requests, whether it is offering a referral to someone else or adding a new skill to your portfolio.

Most of these examples come from personal experience. And while I didn’t fulfill all the requested needs, seeing what a client expects from their perspective is an interesting exercise!

Business / 17 May 2017

How Many Design Options Should You Show a Client?

You’ve been working on a client project for a little while now. It could be a website design, brochure, or something else altogether — but you’ve spent some time on it. You like the concept. Is that all you need to go back to the client with? Or do you need to create a couple more options for the design review?

There’s a balance of creating enough for a client to choose from, and avoiding work that you know will certainly just get thrown aside. If you know the client well, chances are you can present just one design option. (Seriously!)

Inspiration / 16 May 2017

30+ Best Scene and Mockup Generators of 2017

It’s not an easy job to find the perfect image or the mockup to showcase your product when designing a hero image for a website, a header image for a blog, or for an advertising project.

Mostly because high-quality stock photos and images are hard to find, and can come with hefty price tags. Even when you do find a great image, you later discover that someone else is using that exact same image on a different website. Which brings you back to square one. However, there’s a simpler solution to this problem: Scene generators!

Scene and mockup generators are bundles of elements and objects, which you can use to create your own unique header images, product mockup scenes, and custom graphics however you like. The best part is that you’ll be able to use these scene generators to create as many images for different projects.

We handpicked a set of an amazing scene and mockup generators from Envato Elements. You can download all of these files for only $29 per month by simply subscribing to Envato Elements!

Graphics / 15 May 2017

3 Tips for Developing a Unique Logo Design

Every business or website needs one – a logo. A logo is how users and customers will identify your website or brand. And a good logo is identifiable, readable and leaves a lasting impression with users.

Your logo is how people see you across different mediums, from online to social media to printed materials. So how do you develop this key piece of branding if you don’t already have one? (Or how do you rethink the one you have but don’t like?) Here are three tips to help you get started!

Graphics / 10 May 2017

Brutalism: A New Trend in Web Design

Some designs aren’t polished and clean. They are rough, jarring and ragged. Yet they still work and communicate effectively. This class of websites makes up the raw trend called brutalism.

While it is somewhat new to web concepts, it’s been around for decades as a popular technique for posters and art in the 1950s, 60s and 70s. Today’s brutalism is starkly different from what you are used to seeing… and that’s why it’s likely to catch your attention. Let’s take a look at what it is (and I’ll share why I’m already over it!)

Inspiration / 9 May 2017

100+ iPad Mockups: PSDs, Photos & Vectors

For displaying your latest and greatest responsive website design, or app interface, having a beautiful iPad mockup on which to demonstrate it can be really helpful.

Today, we’re taking a look at almost a hundred different iPad and tablet mockups, in all shapes and sizes, that can make your app or website interface stand out. They vary between photograph-based PSD mockups, or vectors that can scale to any size. Some are free, some cost a few dollars, but all of them are rather lovely!

Graphics / 8 May 2017

How to Start and Promote an Illustration Project

Illustration projects can be tough. But if you are an illustrator, it is your job (duty even) to keep drawing and promoting illustration projects. But how do you do it?

How can you sell a client on the concept of an illustration when it can be difficult for them to imagine? You can do it. Here are some tips for getting started. (Plus, this post includes illustration projects to help jumpstart your creativity.)

Freebies / 3 May 2017

20+ Brushes and Images for Creating Grungy Edges

Creating complex edges manually in Photoshop can be an arduous task. Fortunately, there are tons of free brushes and images online that will make this process a breeze.

Keep reading to see our collection of 20 brushes and images with torn, burned and grungy edges!

CSS / 3 May 2017

How to Add Touches of Magic to Your Interactions

Every time a user does something with your design, an interaction is created. Some interactions, such as clicks, go almost unnoticed by the user. But other interactions include a certain bit of magic that makes the user want to play with the design even more.

There’s a fine line between an interaction that has the touch of magic and one that can be completely overwhelming. The most magical interactions are a bit unexpected, simple, create an emotional response and make the user want to use it again.

Inspiration / 2 May 2017

15+ Best Bootstrap Admin Templates of 2017

Planning to develop a new web app? Or create a stunning backend membership area for your services? Then it’s time to start thinking about designing an admin dashboard.

Creating an effective admin dashboard that your users enjoy coming back to over and over again can be a challenging task. You have to work with user experience designers to make sure the design offers the best experience to your users.

Thankfully, we have a solution that’ll help you save a lot of money and time, by starting with one of these stunning admin templates!

Graphics / 1 May 2017

Stunning Examples of White Space… That Aren’t White at All

When you think of white space in web design, examples such as Apple or Google are probably the first ones that come to mind. While these companies do a great job of using white space in their designs, there are plenty of other ways to make the most of space.. even if it isn’t always white.!

White space is an important part of your design plan. Here, we’re going to look at the importance of space as a design tool and five examples of websites that are making great use of white space (that isn’t white at all).

The Gallery

A curated selection of beautiful websites, branding, and logo designs. Updated daily.

By:	Carrie Cousins
On:	24 May 2017
Topics:	Navigation

Graphics / 23 May 2017

Business / 22 May 2017

Business / 17 May 2017

Inspiration / 16 May 2017

Graphics / 15 May 2017

Graphics / 10 May 2017

Inspiration / 9 May 2017

Graphics / 8 May 2017

Freebies / 3 May 2017

CSS / 3 May 2017

Inspiration / 2 May 2017

Graphics / 1 May 2017

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