Colourful and Pretty header-graphics

Posted on 10. Apr, 2012 by razi in Illustrator, Photoshop, Showcase

We are showing some ideas in this showcase the designs listed below were
selected for their attention to small details . Pretty
and colorful header-graphics does not make a good blog. The blog needs a
solid visual structure, a profound grading of site elements ; it also
has to be able to build some kind of a bridge between the content and
its appearance. To do this, you need to think about precision,
Minimalism and sound use of illustration. These conditions were the ones
we have used to select the designs listed below. All these aspects make
the designs we have selected look well, not always beautiful, but
outstanding, almost excellent in their own kind. Mostly its the idea
the designers used to make the weblog as usable as possible not the
Implementation of this idea which we have been after. Below you will find 45 excellent blog designs which
Impress with creative approaches and attention to details; hopefully
you will find new ideas you can develop further in your own designs.

Designing a blog is easy. Whatever engine you are using
and whatever style you prefer, you shall always find a number of templates
you can apply to your weblog in seconds. No styling is necessary, no
playing with colors is needed and no mind pushing about content
Presentation is required. However, not every weblog should
look like a typical blog.
After all, not every blogger wants his or her site to look exactly like
hundreds of other ones. In fact, there is a small bunch of creative,
outstanding and individually designed from scratch blogs.

In this post we didn’t try to showcase some eye-candy (although
sometimes eye-candy is indeed offered); the designs listed below were
selected for their attention to small details. Pretty
and colorful header-graphics does not make a good blog. The blog needs a
solid visual structure, a profound hierarchy of site elements; it also
has to be able to build some kind of a bridge between the content and
its presentation. To do this, you need to think about precision,
Minimalism and sound use of illustration. These criteria were the ones
we have used to select the designs listed below. All these aspects make
the designs we have selected look well, not always beautiful, but
outstanding, almost excellent in their own kind. Mostly its the idea
the designers used to make the weblog as usable as possible not the
implementation of this idea which we have been after.

In this post we didn’t try to showcase some eye-candy (although
sometimes eye-candy is indeed offered); the designs listed below were
selected for their attention to small details . Pretty
and colorful header-graphics does not make a good blog. The blog needs a
solid visual structure, a profound hierarchy of site elements; it also
has to be able to build some kind of a bridge between the content and
its presentation. To do this, you need to think about precision,
Minimalism and sound use of illustration. These criteria were the ones
we have used to select the designs listed below. All these aspects make
the designs we have selected look well, not always beautiful, but
outstanding, almost excellent in their own kind. Mostly it’s the idea
the designers used to make the weblog as usable as possible not the
implementation of this idea which we have been after.

Below you will find 45 excellent blog designs which
Impress with creative approaches and attention to details; hopefully
you will find new ideas you can develop further in your own designs.

Weblogs powered by Django

Ryan Berg (Django)

Derek Featherstone (Django)

⁴

Jeff Croft (Django)

⁵

Andy Hume (Django)

⁶

Weblogs powered by ExpressionEngine

Jesse Bennett-Chamberlain (Expression Engine)
Whitespace in use. The categories and popular entries are listed at the top of the page, not in the sidebar as they usually are.

⁷

Veerle Pieters

An almost “classic”, well-known design, but still incredibly
beautiful. Veerle makes use of a dark layout with quite colourful
scheme. The result is impressive – and the position of site elements
extremely well thought-out.

⁸

Emanuel Blagonic (Expression Engine WordPress)

⁹

Weblogs powered by MovableType

Kevin Kornell (Movable Type)
A typical weblog doesn’t look like an illustrated magazine. Kevin Kornell’s blog does. This one makes use of an “oldie”-style.

¹⁰

Cameron Moll

¹¹

Dave Shea (Movable Type)

¹²

Dan Cederholm (Movable Type)

¹³

Weblogs powered by Textpattern

Praegnanz.de (Textpattern)
A minimalistic approach with clean web-typography.

¹⁴

Hicksdesign (Textpattern)

¹⁵

Geniant (Textpattern)

¹⁶

Blogs powered by WordPress

Circle Six (WordPress)

¹⁷

Pedro Lamin (WordPress)
Fresh and clean design, lacking almost everything – there is even no navigation in blog categories.

¹⁸

Design Disease (WordPress)

¹⁹

Surfgarden (WordPress)

²⁰

Dan Rubin (WordPress)

²¹

NorthxEast (WordPress)

²²

Larissa Meek (WordPress)

²³

Matt (WordPress)
A Business-Design. Look at the information sections on the left side of the layout.

²⁴

Agenturblog (WordPress)

²⁵

Ben Gillbanks (WordPress)

²⁶

Rik Catlow (WordPress)

²⁷

FreelanceSwitch (WordPress)

²⁸

Shaun Inman (WordPress custom PHP-Framework. Thanks, Shaun)

³⁰

Mstefan.com (WordPress)

³¹

Screenz (WordPress)

³²

Screencasting (WordPress)

³³

Blog.Critical (WordPress)

³⁴

Wan Zafran (WordPress)

³⁵

Viki (WordPress)
Extensive use of visual elements prevails; it might be a nice idea, but the content should prevail.

³⁶

Nick La (WordPress)
Playful design with dozens of swirls, curves and artistic elements.

³⁷

Laura Alter (WordPress)

³⁸

Markus Zeeh (WordPress)
Playful flower-images and ornaments seem to be trends.

³⁹

Sidney Collins (WordPress)

⁴⁰

Roman Leinwather (WordPress)

⁴¹

Bottled Sky (WordPress)
Probably not the most gorgeous layout ever made, but well-structured. The use of colors communicates the idea of the site.

⁴²