Where It Began
The very first website on the World Wide Web was created by Tim Berners-Lee who designed the website at the Swiss research center, CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research). Spot the first ever site in the gif above.
HTML 2.0 was released in 1995, supporting graphics, forms, tables, and more. This gave developers more creative liberties in page organization. In 1996, Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) became available and directed the display and style of HTML coded design elements like colour, layout, and typography.
As time went on, more and more people created websites for business purposes, information distribution, and a growing trend – blogging.
WordPress was originally launched as an open source blogging platform, but steadily grew and evolved until it became the most popular content management system (CMS) in the world. In fact, WordPress now powers 35.9% of the internet. This timeline would be remiss if it didn’t acknowledge the entrance of MySpace (2003) and Facebook (2004).
The dawn of social media, self expression, and online connection had arrived, and MySpace and Facebook set the stage for a new level of interaction. This kicked web design into high gear as there was now a market for designing ads, widgets for websites, and graphics and images for social profiles.As social media evolved, successful business became tied to successful social media campaigns.
Apple had just released the first iPhone and it was a game changer. When Steve Jobs gave his legendary presentation of the iPhone and explained that the Safari browser was “the first fully usable HTML browser on a phone”.
As the world turned towards mobile web experiences, responsive and mobile friendly design became a necessity. In 2010, web designer Ethan Marcotte published the article, “Responsive Web Design”, which outlined how to optimize content based on resolution or display size. Five years later, not only would having a responsive website improve your Google ranking, but Google would penalize you for having a non-responsive website.
The 2010s saw a shift from rich design (shadows, depth, colour gradients, textures, flashy animated gifs, etc.) to flat design (clean, minimalistic, bright colours, 2D icons, san-serif typography, etc.).
Prior to flat design, the skeuomorphic qualities in rich design had provided a “real-life” or 3D feel, but the added design complexity meant slower loading times and added busyness and noise to the page. The transition to flat design gave a distinctly “digital” feel and delivered a more clear and efficient user experience.
Both Microsoft and Apple pioneered the shift to flat design. Microsoft did so through Windows Media Center, and Apple transitioned with iOS 7.
