The Miasma of Style

One of the natural tendencies that drive people towards bad design is to overclock the significance, or to style by content rather than function. When I started out in web design I thought it would be a "cool idea" to boldface the important concept in each paragraph. While that might give speed readers an edge, it gave everyone else migranes.

Similarly, with headers, one can really indulge ones lust for color and typography. I have to say even this site pretty much falls into this crutch -- my only defense is I acquired this template and am still working on its elegance. As of this writing, I can spot at least seven types of headers in Wonderland Labs -- the words "Wonderland Labs.com", the subhead ("That which cannot be rendered in binary is by definition a delusion"), three different typography styles in the search banner, a header style for the left navigation, a bookmark style, and the two styles which are always defensible, title and body.

Consider the header: would it really hurt if all the type were the same font and size? Perhaps with boldface for the site name, or a color shift. The breadcrumb is colored because it is a link -- but why not color it after all the other links in the site, or trust the reader to click backwards even through it is not color hinted?

I chose to use the title font for the left nav headers -- why not also use the same color as the main headlines? or just use the font style for the left navigation, but bold the headlines? 

The more you use what we call in fine arts a "limited palette" the more self-referntial the design becomes and the more integrity the overall effect has. For instance, even in comic books, one of the most visually excessive (and successfuly so) media out there, body font and speech font is usually uniform. Once in a while they will play with the font -- say to indicate a "robot accent" or whatever -- but for the most part, typographic experiment is limited to sound effects. This convention gives comics a foundational convention that anchors the design, allowing for the  free-form use of graphics and illustration to blow you away, without limiting your ability to read the narrative.