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If there is one thing that places a designer into an admired category of great designers it is the attention to details. When the designer is able to focus on small, usually ignored details and creatively integrate them with the rest of the design, often taking it to new heights, making them to stand out and zero in our attention, that’s when we feel a presence of the virtuoso at work. That’s when we sense a premeditated approach of an artisan meticulously crafting a work of art.
Sometimes in order to transform our homes all we need is a fresh different paint on the walls or a re-arranged furniture. When designing blogs you can achieve a similar metamorphosis by concentrating your attention on a few often unnoticeable elements such as:
- Post’s Title/Author’s name
- Date
- Icons for bulleted lists
- Comments area
- Notification messages (e.g. number of comments in the post)
The extra time and efforts spent on exercising your imagination when designing your blogs/websites pays of handsomely in the form of the following benefits:
- Your memorable design stands out among the millions of other blogs
- Your blog gets featured in many galleries and articles like this one
- Your originality brings you more admiration from the blog’s visitors
- You are perceived as a professional who pays attention to details not only in design but also in the quality of the blog’s content
I’ve scoured the web looking for inventive and creative solutions to give a quick makeover to a blog. I feel like I was showered with inspirational waters of imaginative designs. I’ve categorized my finds under captivating post titles/dates, bulleted list icons, stylization of the comment area. Each of the thumbnails below is linked to the original site. I strongly encourage you to visit the actual blogs to see these details in full glory.
Distinctive Icons for unmatched bulleted lists
Striking Dates for busy people
Creative Titles that stimulate
Fascinating Comments
Now, all I need is time to revamp my own blog’s design. What about you, are you famous for paying attention to details?
This is a great collection Vivien. Working on designs is all about paying attention to detail.
I can guarantee that people spent a great deal of time coming up with those unique details you mentioned above.
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Thanks for the mention! I agree with you that often the smallest considerations make the largest differences to a blog.
One huge bugbear of mine is when blog authors only provide a link to the comment form at the beginning of an article. This is completely illogical – I will decide whether or not to leave a comment after reading a post, so why doesn’t the link appear at the end?
In order to leave a comment I then have to scroll all the way to the top of the article! Ridiculous!
How can such a small thing drive me so crazy?!?
- Martin Reed
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Creative way to illustrate your point. I already had the Community Spark site bookmarked because of the way it displayed dates. I hope to get around to something like that one day.
Design and presentation are two things I am very weak on. Thanks for continuing to prod me into doing something about it.
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That’s an interesting list. I recognised a few of these but others were new to me.
I’ve been meaning to start a collection of these kinds of snippets for a while but haven’t quite got round to it. You have inspired me to think about it again.
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Very interesting, and inspiring list – - thanks for putting it together for the rest of us. I always look for the odd detail in a site design – - I skip right past the magnificent header graphic and look at what kind of tiny details that make a house a home.
Also, thank you for the mention! Cheers!
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You’re all very welcome. I’m really glad you found this collection helpful and inspiring.
You’re right, Ronald – it’s adding the finishing touches to the design that requires a lot of time and involves lots of thinking.
Martin, I agree with you – although it’s nice to see the number of comments at the top of the post, it’s best to include a link to comment at the end of the post. It is a nuisance to scroll all the way up to get to the comment page.
Joey and Andrew, I’m glad to see that I managed to inspire to start thinking about these design details again :-)
Lisa, I’m a big fan of your designs. Love the new look you gave to Technosailor. And congratulations with completing WordPress for Dummies book. :-)
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I like the way you have split everything down into small detail. It’s so easy just to think of the big picture when you are designing something and forget about the small details especially when time is short.
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Nice article Vivien. :) I like the way you focused on those 5 points.
Those people indeed worked hard for those specific site elements, and it shows.
I do not know if I am famous or not for paying attention to details, though I know I focus a lot on different details. This article should help me improve my site, however. :)
Thanks for a nice read! :)
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I was looking for some inspiration. Looking to at a few subtle changes (minor details) to my own blog. I like the Erika Greco dates – and achieved with a simple bit of CSS and a background image.
Also like some of the detail on this site:
http://www.jrvelasco.com/
And….I’m writing something now…hope to have ready before 24!
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I love detail, but procrastinate out of frustration at learning all the CSS required. I am learning little bits at a time and gathering ideas to upgrade my free bloggers templates to reflect the detailed “me” – with help. Loved the way you present this post.
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Thanks so much for linking me. I’m honoured to be listed alongside so many other accomplished designers. :)
Cheers!
V xx
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Excellent stuff Vivien! There’s some awesome blogs in there, and a few I haven’t seen before.
I like to think I pay attention to detail in my designs. I’m what one of my clients called a ‘pixel perfectionist’ – a title that I’d be glad to own! :)
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Really inspiring article, Vivien. You’ve presented the article really well :) I always like to poke into minute details :D . Now I see on your blog’s sidebar – the new distinctive bulleted list icons :) Cool.
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Thanks everyone. I’m very glad that you found this article inspiring.
Let there be more interesting blog designs in the blogiverse.
I agree with you, Tara, it’s easy to forget about the details because we concentrate so much on working on the overall design of the site. But I guess these little details are the ones that many designers keep tweaking on their sites, trying to achieve the perfect and happy medium.
Bes, did I notice it correctly – did you recently change your comments area slightly, by styling the number of the each comment? Looks very neat.
Thanks for the link to Velasco site, Johno. It has a very interesting, almost psychedelic look. I look forward to reading that intriguing article you’re working on. One more way to go :-) Good luck with it.
Marcia, it must be very frustrating to change the free blogger’s templates on blogspot. Fortunately, I never had to deal with it. But don’t give up, you’re already on the right track with your blog’s design.
You’re very welcome, Vixx. I absolutely love the way you style the dates/time/titles/number of comments on your blog. How did you come up with this idea, where did you draw the inspiration for it?
Thanks, Shankar, I see you have a hawk’s eye there, don’t you? :-)
Paul, “pixel perfectionist”. You should add this characteristics to your business signature, so that all your clients would call you that. Based on those designs by you that I’ve seen, that name suits you very much.
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Thank you so much for including my site in your article! And it’s such an interesting topic, too. I don’t see many articles that focus on these oft-overlooked details.
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I’m very flattered to be included on this list! I agree with your post that attention to details is important in designing — too often, they are overlooked by designers who only want to focus on the “big picture”. What they don’t realize is that it’s frequently a combination of the small things that makes an amazing composition overall.
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