Design State: A weblog about government web design

I’m collaborating with GovLoop in my Ask The Design State video series. Here’s the first installment, just a very basic overview of what design is. If you’ve got a question you’d like me to answer, head on over here and let me know.

Transcript

Welcome to the first installment of Ask GovLoop. My name is Adam Harvey. I’m a web designer in Cleveland, OH. I’m going to talk about design, if you’ve got a minute.

When I think about design in a broad sense, I think about how well something works and how intuitive it is to use. Aesthetics comes in second to usability. Yet for me, the opposite holds true with websites. The first thing I pay attention to is how pretty the site is, and I think about its usability only after that first impression.

Yet web design isn’t just about how pretty a site looks; the effectiveness of its layout and usefulness of its content are equally important. All three of these pieces are necessary for a top-notch website.

So when you visit a site, or look at your own, ask yourself:

1. Is the site aesthetically pleasing?
2. Is the layout intuitive?
3. Is the content useful?

and you’ll get a better idea of what separates good design from bad. Thanks for listening!

I just completed my submission for the National Design Policy Council’s video campaign. I figured that it would be helpful to explain the importance of design to non-designers through the use of practical examples. Here are the questions I answered:

1. What role does design play in US economic competitiveness?
2. What role does design play in the US democratic governance?
3. In what specific ways, would a national design policy further enable design to play those roles?
4. What would you pledge to do to help design play that role?

Here’s the video:

I created a separate page for this little project so that when this post rolls off the front page, the information will still be easy to find.