If the most valuable web design tip I learn this year is that this site exists: http://subtlepatterns.com/

...Then it will have been a decent year

Then let me make it a super extra fun year :)

http://sachagreif.com/the-design-freebies-list/

My collection of files is growing really nicely :) Do you use anything in particular to manage all of these resources locally?

As a designer, this is why I love working with startups. You can go from idea to actual live site in a few days only.

Paradoxically, it was a lot of fun working on such a short timeline: it basically took all the pressure off and made sure I couldn't second-guess myself.

"Paradoxically, it was a lot of fun working on such a short timeline: it basically took all the pressure off and made sure I couldn't second-guess myself."

I couldn't agree more. I often give myself artificially short deadlines if I'm having designer's block, it works wonders.

That's part of what appealed to me at the ad agency I worked at. It's fun to build things as quickly as possible sometimes. I'm glad I'm not doing that constantly anymore though.

Title should actually be "How I Re-designed Code Year in 1 Hour".

No it should be "How I Re-designed Promo Material for Code Year in 1 Hour"

Great writeup, and helpful for people like me. I often know exactly what message I want to deliver and the visual hierarchy I want, but coming up with a nice layout is harder. So the break down is good to see.

It was pretty shocking to see the McCurry Afghan girl photo as an icon placeholder though. That's probably one of the top 5 news photos of all time, and I'm not alone in having a strong emotional reaction to it?

Maybe Cookie Monster as a placeholder instead? http://www.google.com/search?q=cookie+monster&hl=en&...

This was a fantastic step by step guide for people who have absolutely no design sense, like me. Thank you!

It's interesting to see the iterative thought process of a designer as they go through and make changes. I wonder if it'd be a good way to learn design. How about Design Year? :P

That's a good idea actually! I could imagine weekly design lessons each focusing on a new design principle or element.

For example, one week you'd design a sign-up form, the next focus on contrast, etc.

If you want to work with Codecademy too, we're hiring ;)

http://codecademy.com/jobs or jobs(at)codecademy(dot)com

thanks!

Are you guys hiring summer interns as well?

Gorgeous design, nice work. Your call to action, the big red "Start learning!", is well done and placed effectively. I like it.

I must be missing something, where's the CSS discussion? Isn't that what takes up most of the time?

This is a serious question. I'm not a front-end guy. Instead of downvoting, can someone enlighten me?

It depends of the design, but I think generally it takes me longer to design mockups than to implement them.

When implementing you know what you should do, and when know your tools, you can pretty much do it as fast as you can type.

When designing you start from scratch. You try to wrestle all the ideas and requirements with the best practices and the right style, to create something that's new and works.

So I think designing well is much harder than implementing the design well.

The article was about design, not implementation.