Purely Ugly Pages

Let's be clear here, purely ugly is not the same thing as unattractive, or unimaginative. And I don't mean a page that just fails to appeal! I'm talking about so ugly that anyone with any sense of taste would recoil in horror!

We are talking colossally, mind-bogglingly ugly. Plain is a different thing, and sites are often described as ugly when they are really just unappealing or without embellishment. I don't mean that. I mean when someone DID embellish it, but did it all wrong!

Clashing styles, conflicting colors, wrangling textures, and other elements that, when combined, end up dominating the site with a message of repulsion that overpowers the content.

You may think I am exaggerating. I'm not. I have seen some hideously ugly sites in the years that I have been designing sites. They tend to be designed by the kind of people who were, in the eighties, still wearing orange polyester pants, with green plaid shirts from two decades before.

Now, bad taste is no determiner of character. My grandmother, who had a kind heart, loved to crochet. She combined colors that really should not have been combined, into items that were completely unattractive, and totally useless. Her character was noble and appreciated. Her Christmas gifts were not always, because she had no understanding of artistic aesthetics, contemporary fashion, or color combinations. She lived in a day when you must never wear red and purple at the same time, but where green, brown, and mustard yellow were an acceptable combination, and she could not see past the rules she had been taught. She saw things through those rules rather than with her eyes.

So this is not an indictment of any person who has no taste in design. It is merely an indictment of those who insist on keeping sites as they built them after they have been told that it is not usable. Some people do not innately understand how others will perceive visual elements. Some people do. It is only a problem if you insist that you can, when you can't!

If you have any question about the design of your site, ask your neighbor - You know, the one with the tastefully decorated home? Ask an interior designer, or someone who sells popular craft items (the popular part is important!). They'll know whether or not your site is acceptable. It doesn't have to be any particular STYLE, it just needs to coordinate and work to present a unified message and feel!

Ugly design is rarely a matter of any single element being ugly in itself. It is usually an issue of the elements being put together in the wrong combination. So frequently, the solution to ugliness is merely changing one or two elements so that they coordinate instead of conflicting.

When in doubt about colors, use three of a similar hue - light blue, royal blue, and navy - and add black and white.

When in doubt about patterns, keep them subtle, low contrast, and use the same one in two shades.

When in doubt about page embellishments, keep it simple. Simple is almost always better than complex.

If something doesn't quite go, leave it off.

Never get too attached to a particular design idea - this is a fatal flaw that often gets in the way for beginners, but which any good professional will not do! If the original idea does not work, discard it without regret!

With every design, there is a point where it comes together, and "clicks". Keep tweaking until you get to that point, but if you tweak a lot and it still doesn't work, don't be afraid to scrap the whole thing and start over in a different direction.

Plain sites can work well, unimaginative ones can excel. Slightly unattractive ones can even get by. But downright ugly ones will repel, and conflict with your business message.