Great web design is a lot of things to a lot of people. For some it is the usability while for others it is the aesthetic layout. However, great web design has to include a measure of both of these. Great designs look clean and professional, are easy to use, evoke the intended emotion or feel they were designed to evoke and have good navigation. In design, there are established principles that must be applied before any design can look appealing. One of these is balance. Balance is the distribution of light and heavy elements on a web page. When elements are larger and darker, they appear heavier and when they are smaller they look lighter. Balancing helps you lay you pages in way that works. Another principle is that of contrast. Contrast is not just about black and white or just colors. It also involves contrasting shapes, sizes and textures. The use of squares, circles and smooth or rough textures is an important principle for any great web design.
Consider also the principle of emphasis. This is what draws the eye. In great web design, emphasis is applied based on a page hierarchy. When this principle is not fully applied, a design ends up looking flat, thereby defeating the whole purpose. Rhythm and unity are also other principles to consider if you want to create a great web design layout. Rhythm or repetition brings internal consistency to web designs and makes it easier for visitors to comprehend a site. When web pages employ rhythm for example, it will be shown by consistency in the design of all pages. Templates generally employ this principle making the design simple to the eye. IN addition, a designer will only need to change a few details for each page. Unity or proximity is keeping elements together and diverse elements further apart. When this principle is applied, elements are pulled together, a mark of great web design.
In addition to the look, a great web design also needs to take into consideration things like search engine optimization and CSS layouts. A web page needs to be small enough to allow for fast load times. In addition, the use of Cascading Style Sheets or CSS allows for the addition of extra elements without the need of using heavy graphics that will increase load times. The use of JavaScript to create effects also eliminates the need to use graphically intensive flash. Indeed, great web design is all about creating appealing pages that are fast loading giving a user-friendly browsing experience to both the users and the search engines.