Simplicity

I wrote recently about how my daughter Lyla is starting to understand the basic principles of design. She's manager of a dance team at a local high school and is responsible for helping to create posters and other decorative items. Her most recent struggles have involved convincing others that "less is more." One girl has lovely handwriting so she was tasked with hand-lettering. But Lyla tells me it's a constant battle to get others to stop trying to add too many extra colors and stickers and such that only serve to hide the message and the pretty lettering.

Her new mantra at the school is "simplicity." It's a battle most all designers have fought in one form or another -- with themselves or with clients. If one picture is nice, two or three is even better, right? If you want to get attention then throw in lots of bold letters, wild colors, pointing arrows, and every other attention-grabbing device in your arsenal. If it looks wrong, the first thought for many isn't to take something away but to add more, more, more.

Before you point the finger at the client or the kid next door, though, make sure your own simplicity meter is in good shape. There's even a book or two on the subject. Less is More: The New Simplicity in Graphic Design (compare prices) isn't a new book (1999) but then again, less is more isn't a new idea. It's just one that is easier said than done. Another, more recent look at the subject is Graphic Simplicity (compare prices). Part of the product description pretty much restates what I said up above about knowing what to take away, "Simplicity is an ultimate element in design, but it is not so easy for a graphic designer to reach a level where he/she can choose only essential elements and discard the others."

This blog post focusing on Web design asks "Why is Simple So Difficult?" Some good thoughts expressed here. And this article, Simplicity: The Cobbles of the Designer's Path, again talks about Web sites but much can apply to print as well. "The path away from disaster passes through self-negation: when a site is designed using simplicity as the cornerstone, the designer has to sacrifice some of his/her ego."