Quick sidenote – Google is now passing out invitations to try out Google Wave. If you have not yet signed up, be sure to do so. We will be checking out Wave soon and showing you some really cool stuff that it is capable of. But for now, back to what we were talking about before…

Google.com is perhaps one of the most important destinations that people have, for years, pointed their browsers to. We have all come to know the minimalist look of the Google homepage, with its simple search and its signature “I’m Feeling Lucky” button. Today, we will look at a few things that Google has done with their homepage.

Google is, obviously, meant for a very large target audience. The image of Google is known to be very simple, and doesn’t follow any specific “trend” or “style”, per se. Rather, Google has designed their products (like GMail, Calendars, Docs, etc.) by using color and a white backdrop. In particular, Google uses primary colors (blue, red, and yellow) as their main branding color scheme, and one secondary color (green). This emphasizes Google’s elemental emphasis.
Note: this is separate for iGoogle, which allows for more customization and a “homepage”

But let’s look again at Google’s homepage.

Google has, without making it completely obvious, made blue their primary branding color. If all we do is take away the letters other than the two g’s, we are left with neutral (grayscale) and – you guessed it – blue.

Note: This image has been manipulated, and is not a product of Google

It’s pretty easy to see in this context that Google relies heavily on a blue color scheme for their image. Studies have shown that blue is calming and suggests reliability; two things which users who come to Google probably need. I don’t know about you, but I usually go to Google for one of two things: either I have a question or problem that I need an answer to, or I am browsing the Internet. These two activities call for reliability and reassurance, both of which Google has subtly cognitively offered.

So, why include the other colors?

First of all, not everything about blue is positive. In fact, if Google were entirely blue, we as users would most likely get a cold, uninviting feeling from the home page. The red “o” and “e” help suggest the brevity of using Google, while the yellow “o” serves to grab attention. The substance of the word “Google” is increased by including the yellow. The green “l” breaks from the possible monotony of using only primary colors, establishing a sense of permanency.

What can we learn from it?

This study, albeit short and limited to Google’s front page, shows us how easily we can make effective decisions without going overboard. These subtle decisions were most likely intentional. In fact, we’d bet on it. What are some ways you can make subtle decisions in your interface? Check out a few of our other posts to see some of the best practices in interface design!

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Minimalism is very underrated. Most don’t appreciate the beauty of minimalism in design. To most it looks too simple; however, it may be the most effective way for the designer to get his or her point across.

Most of the time, it is assumed that minimalism is very simple to create, and often referred to as laziness. Others, such as myself, believe that designing for the bare essentials is actually pretty difficult.

One of the pros of minimalism design is that it reduces the amount of clutter in your user interface. Therefore, the focus is on your content: the main part of your site or application. Plus, simplicity is very easy to take in, captivating your readers’ attention quickly. Today, I’m going to go over some techniques to captivate your readers’ interest and make a wonderful minimalistic site.

There are many ways to enhance your minimalist design. Layout is a very important in your design. You want the readers’ eyes to be drawn from the other components of the site to your content. Typography is also great way to enhance important information. Animation-like effects are great – perhaps using jQuery to make some subtle animations.

Layout

Layout will really make the attention move to your content. A large content area will really make it feel like it is very important. Keep in mind that the human eye is trained to look up (which is tricky for web design). Try and make their eye first go to the logo, then to the content using typography.

Typography

Typography is a very important part of minimalist design as well. The use of type is widely regarded as a very good use of design in your site. Used correctly, it can help create a very good-looking site. If you use the correct combination of serif and sans-serif, then you will get an effective, beautiful result.
If you use large type in your logo and just a bit smaller type in your headers, it will automatically draw interest to that type. If you have a sans-serif, large font as the header, and a serif, small, font as the content, the eyes will go straight from the title to the content.

Simple Animation

And finally, a good technique to use in minimalism is animation effects. It will help make up for the “wow” factor that otherwise doesn’t really exist in minimalism. Add some fade-ins and -outs. Maybe some color-ins. Try and experiment and find whatever will fit your site best. Effects like these can be done with javascript libraries (like jQuery and accompanying plugins fairly easily.

These are only a few good minimalist techniques that exist. Here are a few resources to get you on the path to “less is more”!

Typography Resources:

I Love Typography
We Love Typography
MyFonts

Layout Resources

The Golden Ratio
The Golden Rectangle
60 Layout Tutorials

Animation Resources

jQuery Tutorials

General Minimalism

25 Beautiful Minimalistic Website Designs
“Minimalist” on deviantART

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