Art Direction for the Web by Andy Clarke

Art Direction for the Web Reviews

• 
  Andreas

  Hard to read at times because all the quotes and image captions destroy the flow. Might be a problem with the ebook though.
  
  The book contains nice inspiring examples and works as a call to action to invest more care into page designs. Some examples are a bit far-fetched though and don't illustrate the authors point that well.
  
  The code part felt out of place and it misses guidance on how to bring the ideas presented into larger projects where handcrafting every page isn't an option.
  
  All in all an okay book that can be used as inspiration from time to time but to me doesn't feel like one of the professions must-reads that Clarkes earlier books have been.
• 
  Khue Dinh

  The book gives me a lots of inspiration. I finished the art direction part, but I given up the CSS part. Maybe I will come back this part in the future.
• 
  Amy

  Several CSS code examples showing off what CSS can do in 2019 when it comes to art direction, including typography, images, and more. Clarke especially brings forth the excitement of grid and flexbox, which are big improvements for layout, moving away from floats and tables. This whole book even brands itself throughout each chapter, giving its own example of art direction.
  
  I struggled a bit at the beginning of the book because I develop and design for government sites, and his examples seem best for news outlets and advertising. However, once I hit a lot of practical advice and code examples, I couldn't put it down. I learned several new tricks myself, and have ideas for the more creative parts of the government sites I manage.
  
  2019 is, indeed, an exciting time to be designing websites!
  
  As an added note, I jumped between hardcover and ebook. Ebook was more readable for me, personally, but the hardcover is beautiful to look through.
• 
  Ian

  Most know this author from his detailed articles on Smashing Magazine and from hearing him as a guest on the (now canceled) Boag World podcast. So expectations were already high.
  
  This book is split evenly between design fundamentals and real code implementation. Having both perspectives at such a high-quality level is rare. It's also not for design to code newbies and is what makes this book really worthwhile given all the intro crap out there.
  
  Real-world and fictional layouts highlight key points and are fantastic examples of what the web can be with great art direction. The author goes a step further by jumping right into key CSS properties and methods that make print-type/traditional layouts possible for the web (many of which are overlooked -- i.e. -- columns blew my mind. Why are these not being used everywhere?).
  
  However, I really wanted to see some of the art-direction examples live. Many of the designs (in the art direction section) were questionable in terms of real-world usability and appearance across multiple platforms. Having the ability to click around and play with some of these would've been nice.
• 
  Delonn

  This is a great book for understanding how to design art-directed webpage design. There are also many layout examples and the author explain how we can achieve them with css code provided but not as detailed as I would like them to be, especially you would need a certain degree of knowledge about css before you can really understand it.
  
  One of the best thing I like about this book is that the author also showcased how a design can be done a different screen size like mobile, tablet and desktop. Understanding that some parts of design gets to be responsive while some parts gets to be adaptive as the whole point of web design in this era are meant to fluid, not rigid.
• 
  Nela

  I didn't keep up with all the new CSS properties that were introduced over the past years, since I was more focused on other areas of design. I got way behind and feeling like my websites were stale and predictable. This book was an excellent introduction to all these tools that make designing for the web much more interesting and way easier than it used to be. It provided both the inspiration and the knowledge to make engaging layouts that tell a story. I read it quickly, but I'm pretty sure I'll be revisiting it regularly.
• 
  Marcello

  This book is amazing! With tons of clear examples the author let you understand what art direction is and why it's so important for the web; he embraces the latest features of the browsers to explain how to craft layouts once thought impossibile.
  This book is a must for UX Designers, Visual Designers and Front-end developers to understand betterthe value we can bring to the web platform.
• 
  Scott

  Read it non-stop. The history of art direction in part one is fascinating for anyone interested in the history of design. The sample layouts are inspiring and I loved trying out the css grid code to learn for myself how to build inspired layouts. This book is ace!
• 
  Andrea Bøe Abrahamsen

  Super excited about this book, it blows my mind what one can do with the web with Art Direction design thinking in your arsenal.
• 
  Tim

  "Art Direction For the Web" is an amazing book that provides inspiration for better web design, and practical tips on just how easy it is to implement good design through modern CSS with little to no CSS hacks or 'presentational HTML'.
  
  Andy Clarke does a masterful job of showing the rich history of art direction in print design, and he inspires us to tell stories in the same way through web design. He encourages us that there are no longer the same limitations on web design that we once had. The book also breaks down code examples that are very easy to grasp and use.
  
  I'm really excited to start implementing this book into existing sites and new projects.
  
  Do yourself a favor, spend the money and get the hardcover edition. It's beautifully laid-out and well-written.
• 
  Stig Melón Bratvold

  Great practical tips for creating inspiring layouts for the web inspired by print. Many of the examples does not feel realistic though.