Allen Grinshtein of Layervault may have coined the term “flat design” originally.
Oh dear. This is what happens when your design perspective is limited to the past few years of popular UI design.
“Flat design” was not invented by designers at tech startups. The concept was not popularized by Microsoft. Yes, there has been a recent trend away from the use of shading, texturing, and depth cues. It is a resurgence of something that began much, much longer ago.
Who invented “flat design”? Maybe Josef Müller-Brockmann, 1951? El Lissitzky, 1932? Dribbble users may not care about these names, but the current seasonal trend toward formal simplicity is little more than a rediscovery of the 20th Century's defining graphic design aesthetic, Swiss Modern.
If you're interested in the history of design, and understanding modern visual design in a broader context, I'd suggest Philip B. Meggs' A History of Graphic Design. For something a little more readily available, you might also want to take a look at Guity Novin's History of Graphic Design. Here's the relevant chapter on the Swiss Grid: http://guity-novin.blogspot.com/2011/07/chapter-42-swiss-gra...
Nice, thanks for the book recommendation. Im on the lookout for this exact type of material lately after the realisation that for the amount of design work I do ive really failed to put in a proportionate amount of learning effort compared with programming. Any other recommendations?
“Flat design” was not invented by designers at tech startups. The concept was not popularized by Microsoft. Yes, there has been a recent trend away from the use of shading, texturing, and depth cues. It is a resurgence of something that began much, much longer ago.
Who invented “flat design”? Maybe Josef Müller-Brockmann, 1951? El Lissitzky, 1932? Dribbble users may not care about these names, but the current seasonal trend toward formal simplicity is little more than a rediscovery of the 20th Century's defining graphic design aesthetic, Swiss Modern.
If you're interested in the history of design, and understanding modern visual design in a broader context, I'd suggest Philip B. Meggs' A History of Graphic Design. For something a little more readily available, you might also want to take a look at Guity Novin's History of Graphic Design. Here's the relevant chapter on the Swiss Grid: http://guity-novin.blogspot.com/2011/07/chapter-42-swiss-gra...