We have already witnessed the powers of design in the world of business. It can transform startups into top enterprises worth millions of dollars. In the past, companies reached for designers exclusively at the end of their development processes. But now, we can see how design has become an important part of any product or services development process.
This design mindset shift created a place in the markets worldwide and inspired many designers to come up with unique designs to further shape the modern industry. Here are some of the up-and-coming design trends that deserve your attention.
3D Objects
Currently there are many affordable 3D printers on the market. Also, the demand for 3D models designed by professionals is becoming greater by each passing day. This is a great example of how technology advancements have a direct impact on creating a design trend.
Designers and animators who are proficient in any of the 3D modeling programs are high in demand. One of the many applications of 3D object design and printing is rapid prototyping, which requires a designer who can quickly turn product concepts into 3D models.
This helps manufacturers cut down the expenses of mass production, improves their inventory management and reduces warehouse space. Besides, we can see the ecommerce industry going for 3D objects of their products on their online stores.
Bold and Customized Typography
This trend sends a clear message to the designers. Typography is not only reserved for reading, but it should be also used for making a statement. The best way to understand this is to look at some design products under this trend’s influence and see how typography centers the attention of the viewer.
Typography is a great artistic choice, because it can be combined quite well with various design techniques. Creating drama with letters, various shapes and colors is an effective way to build your marketing campaign around. Furthermore, designing a catchy composition is much easier when you can use different typeface styles and sizes.
Typography can easily become a new renaissance for designers. We can see that Google, Apple and Amazon are innovating by using their own custom typefaces. Large drop caps and handwritten fonts are also the trends that add a “playful” element to typography design.
Utilization of Negative Space
Negative space is an essential part of any good design, as minimalism has taken its hold in the modern world. Negative space is a perfect way to give the composition of your design a more minimal look. Be careful, though, negative space has to be used strategically and in a clever way if you want to achieve that deeper meaning through your design.
By utilizing the negative space, designers are able to create more abstract designs without decreasing its quality or effectiveness. Supporting the main theme of your design in an unexpected way is a great way to attract people’s attention and send a meaningful message. This is why negative space is used in logo design. Negative space design is also very popular in branding projects.
Responsive Design
More than half of internet users use their smartphone devices to access it. All of a sudden, design had to adapt to many screen sizes and on an abundance of different hardware configurations. The answer came with responsive design. This is why it is said that the popularity of responsive design is dictated by the rise of mobile internet usage.
In fact, it is so popular that we can, with almost 100% certainty, say that it is not going anywhere soon. It is a simple and relatively cheap method for businesses to create mobile-friendly websites that are completely functional. However, you should keep in mind that this design trend requires tight cooperation of designers and developers to prevent any performance issues.
Responsive design goes well with minimalism, since it focuses on keeping the page weight down.
Flat Design
Welcome to the era of Flat 2.0. This trend has been with us for exactly 10 years now and it managed to adjust and adapt to all the new design trends. We all remember Microsoft’s mp3 player Zune. That was the first flat design masterpiece. Then it was refreshed and used by Apple in iOS 7 to be finally refined by Google in 2014 and put forth as a design standard in Google’s Material Design.
Mobile apps development firms are mostly hiring designers who are governed by the flat principles. User experience became very important in the business world and it seems that UI flat design provides top-notch experience for mobile users. High usability, fast loading times, easy to mix with intricate design are just few of the characteristics that make flat design very popular.
As you can see, designers will be busy this year, if they are not already, as there are many trends to follow and many new artistic techniques to adopt. It seems that design has finally started taking its well-deserved place as one of the main pillars of a successful online business.
Author bio:
Sam Makad is a business consultant. He helps small & medium enterprises to grow their businesses and Overall ROI. You can follow Sam on Twitter.