Minimal Exhibit

I was looking on Vandelay Design again looking for inspiration the other day and came across a list of other sites in which they share a network together. One of the sites was Minimal Exhibit and I was really drawn to their site because they have compiled a collection of the best sites that have a minimalist design. I personally love sites that are very minimal and have a lot of white space, so I thought this would be a great site to turn to for even more inspiration for designing websites.

Straight from their website, "Minimalism can bring great elegance, beauty, and usability to a website...". This is very true. White space is just as powerful if not more powerful than space that has been filled. Not many people outside the design world would agree, but that's because they don't know what they are talking about! White space is essential for good design and usually clients want to just fill up every space with something. DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT let them do this. It's a bad idea. Minimal Exhibit showcases this idea with all the websites they have compiled.

Another great thing about this site is that designers can submit their own sites to the site and visitors to the site will be able to actually visit that site, so you can get the full gist of the site, rather than just seeing a picture of it. This is great for the designers/owners of the site, because in turn they are getting exposure to their site.

Design Flavr

I found this site when I was searching for some design inspiration and I didn't leave dissatisfied. Designflavr is a good site to get inspiration for any type of work whether it be for a website, typography, digital art, or just random artwork. This site breaks down the artwork for you so you don't have to search forever for something; you can go right to what you are looking for. Or, just browse the entire site, because even if you are looking for something for a website, you might find inspiration from another piece of art that isn't web based. Also, when you click on a piece of art work you like, it gives you the entire piece and who it was created by. AND.... it gives you a list of other artwork you might like based on the piece you clicked on. AWESOME!!! This way you don't have to keep searching for the same look and feel, it just gives it to you. I like this feature because there is nothing worse than finding something you like, but then having to keep searching for another work that's similar; this makes that process much faster.

Also, for you people who like to say something about everything, there is a comment section. I don't post comments myself, but I do like reading what other people have posted and what their thoughts are about the art.

I'm not only inspired by their site and what they provide, but I'm also inspired by their logo. I'm in a Corporate Identity class right now and we are redesigning logos and designflavr's logo really caught my eye. It has a retro feel and its fun and playful. It works well with their overall design of their website.

I hope you visit their site, because I think you will be inspired too!

Vandelay Design

My friend showed me this site called Vandelay Design and I really found it useful and inspiring. They have a lot of photoshop tutorials and links to other sites that can be helpful, such as getting free photoshop brushes or free vector art. I have already gone through some of their photoshop tutorials and used the techniques for a couple of my projects. It's a good site for future reference because they are constantly updating their site and the tutorials, so there is always something new to learn.

They also have links that show the top websites in certain categories, such as best Church websites and best non-profit websites. There is so much to look at. What I like about this site is primarily the tutorials because there are so many and they give you a lot of different looks and feels that you might be trying to create. The tutorials are really easy too, because they go step by step on how to create that particular look. Obviously, as designers, you don't have to use exactly what they are showing you to do in the tutorials, but at least you know how to create that look now and can do variations of it yourself.

So, if I'm ever having a designer's block, I'll go this site to find inspiration.

To get to the tutorials and the cool stuff on their website, you must access their blog page, which can be found at the bottom of the home page.