I’ve done a very difficult thing this week – I’ve admitted to myself that this design is poor.
When I set out tor edesign from the pink design I had last time I had two goals: first, to improve the readability and second to have something nice to look at. Its fair to say that I’ve compromised both of those goals.
This design is overdone, swamps the middle of the page and is way, way too heavy on the eyes. It doesn’t scan well on shorter entries and the lack of a footer makes the whole page unbalanced. I concentrated so much on grandstanding that I forgot a few of the fundemental rules of design. I designed solely for me.
In a way I’m glad I made this live before the CSS Reboot because it certainly wouldn’t grace that competition. I’m not fishing for compliments at all here but clarity after the fact is all too easy and clarity when designing for onesself is never easy to come by.
I have to view this as a learning process and so I’ll be redesigning this blog as much as I can over the next few days. In a way, it’ll tie in nicely to the fact that I’ve just upgraded WordPress to 1.5. Expect something radically different to this design that concentrates on the needs of the user when reading the page, rather than showing all the nifty CSS tricks I’ve learnt.
By the way, if anyone’s having trouble commenting please mail me kevleitchATgmailDOTcom. As I say, I’ve just upgraded and I know at least one person has had trouble adding comments.
Left Brain Right Brain 
So does this mean you’re back onboard for the Reboot?
I agree about the ‘heaviness’ – I’ve been working up my redesign over the last few days, and getting rid of the large blocks of deep colour was the best decision I’ve made so far.
Looking forward to the next iteration…
I’m going to try and get it done ASAP because its really bugging me and I’m flat out at work and at home at the moment so, depending on extra busy I get….maybe ;o)
Hmmm, I don’t think it’s as poor as you say but I remember feeling the same about my tomatoes design. Come to think of it I feel pretty much the same about the latest, four weeks on, but I really can’t be arsed to re-do!
Good luck anyhow!
I like everything red so won’t comment on the “heaviness”.
This obsession with redesigning is common to all of us. Having a site where you can do whatever you want is overwhelming. Designer madness kicks in and you’re never really satisfied with anything.
Look forward to the new look.