Free Guide to Web Design, web page design tutorials

A complete guide to designing web sites that work

Ben Hunt has been a successful web designer and developer for over 10 years. He publishes this site to share his experience in making web sites that are appealing, easy to use, and successful.

Latest

We've just launched (Friday 25 April) our new web design forums, where anyone can go and discuss issues around web design: Best practice, Pixel-saving design principles, Web2.0 style, Production techniques using HTML & CSS etc., ... or anything else!.

Come along and join in!

10 Free Ways to Promote your Business Online

A quick round-up of 10 essential sites that'll let you promote your (or your client's) local business on the web - for free.

New eBook - Web page production with xHTML and CSS #1

Experience the thought process of a professional web producer as he guides you through the web page production process, from photoshop design to working HTML template.

The book tells you how to approach web production, beginning with semantic HTML, guiding you through how to slice up a photoshop document, and finally how to use CSS for presentation.

Buy now for only £9.00 GBP ...

New eBook - Guide to Semantic HTML

Ben Hunt adds another great eBook to the collection with his "Guide to Semantic HTML". The book gives you advice and tips on how, and why to use semantic HTML.

Included is a comprehensive list of HTML tags, each with their semantically appropriate uses, along with a worked example taking you through the process of how to build a website using semantic HTML.

Buy now for only £5.00 GBP ...

Advertise on Web Design from Scratch

On a typical day, this site gets over 9,000 unique visitors from all round the world, interested in the best of web design style & development. It's a fantastic platform to promote your web-related business.

We have set up new advertising slots in 3 main sections of the site (Web2.0, General Web Design, and Production). All pages in each section feature a leader (page top) plus 5 promos (page foot).

Anyone in the UK want to join us on a fun run in Manchester for a Good Cause? (Sunday 18th May)

Our friends at JAMES, the charity that provided free training in life-saving techniques for children in emergencies, are looking for a few more people to do the BUPA Great Manchester Run on Sunday 18th May.

Places are £29.00 to enter, which includes a JAMES t-shirt or running vest, but more importantly your sponsorship will help raise money for a great cause.

There's free transport laid on to and from the event, as well as snacks and a few well deserved glasses of wine or beer for the return leg!

Contact Lindsey Horsnall to book your place!

Real Web2.0 Design & Branding

The essence of what design means in Web2.0 terms is more than skin-deep. Web 2.0 design is not the same as star flashes and shiny table effects.

It's about a certain brand attitude that fits with the economic & technological Web2.0, which focuses on simplicity and pixel-saving to deliver a clean, honest, up-front, punchy experience.

This article attempts to illustrate the key factors with a handful of examples.

Introduction to Search Engine Optimisation

A layman's guide to the minimum that every web designer, producer, coder, or site owner should know about SEO (Search Engine Optimisation).

Scratchmedia's latest project - Kathink, the ideas marketplace

The Scratchmedia team has been hard at work for several months developing this new online business.

Kathink is a revolutionary online marketplace for ideas & business thinking. It lets companies source all kinds of professional services with greater control over costs, timing, and requirements.

How it works

Companies can go to Kathink with any requirement for best practice, new ideas, analysis, strategy - anything! They post their request, together with details of the fee they'd expect to pay, and when they need a response.

Requests are viewed by registered Business Thinkers (genreally professionals in their own fields: marketing, business, creative, technology etc.) who can submit proposals for how they'd fulfil the client's need, giving an overview of their ideas and their proposed fee. Business Thinkers

Clients can commission one or more Business Thinkers to deliver fully worked-out ideas, for an agreed fee.

Kathink.co.uk is the first site, focusing on the UK market, and Kathink will be launching worldwide over the coming weeks.

Web design versus “Design toss”

A bit of a splurge against the noisy and opinionated minority opinion prevalent in web design that argues that the only good design is intense and beautiful graphic art.

The fact is that most web design should help people quickly and easily find what they want, not stop them in their tracks with impressive graphical experiences. Sometimes, beautiful is not best. Everyday, “vernacular” design is the ideal for most projects.

CMS from Scratch is now Open-Source

Tthe super-lightweight Content Management System that Scratchmedia developed for our own clients is now available for free to everyone!

CMS from Scratch runs on most PHP-enabled servers, and has been designed to be the easiest and quickest way to make your HTML pages client-editable.

With a brief orientation, you can make an existing flat HTML page client-editable in minutes, and convert a whole site in under an hour!

It's a white-label system, so you can add huge value to your clients and get all the credit!

The latest version has a simple and super-efficient AJAX user interface that anyone can use within minutes.

Check out our demo video to see just how quick it is to set up your site using CMS from Scratch!

And we're here to help you through the set-up and learning process, so there's nothing to stop you.

Learn more about CMS from Scratch at cmsfromscratch.com »

To download the code, visit the CMS from Scratch project at Google Code.

Web 2.0 Design Style Guide in PDF

You can now download the Web 2.0 Design Guide and the Current Style summary article together in one handy ebook to read offline.

10 best-designed web sites in the world

My personal favourite sites today, with explanations of why they're so good.

How to design Web2.0 style web pages

My definitive guide to today's best web design style.

A new in-depth breakdown of the Web 2.0 design style, with explanations of why the various design features work, and when & how to implement them.

Web hosting providers compared »

Web hosting is now cheaper for everyone, but the difference between the best hosts and the rest is as great as ever. To pick the right host for your needs, you need real, useful info.

We've teamed up with RealMetrics to provide invaluable information on the best web hosting providers. You can now see real data gathered on shared, virtual private machine, and email hosting over the past few weeks, to help you decide on the best provider for you.

Supporters group hug

I've put up a page just to thank everyone who's supported this site with donations and stuff. Feel the love!

Summary of web design trends

A quick tour of some of the best designs on the web today, in which I analyse some of the design features they have in common.

Please support Web Design from Scratch

I'm committed to keeping Web Design from Scratch free. If you find the site useful, please support us by making a donation, which will go towards our hosting costs. Many thanks!

If you like Web Design from Scratch, you'll love our new ebook.
“Save the Pixel - the Art of Simple Web Design” features loads of new content by Ben Hunt PLUS 21 new web site redesigns that show elegant simple design in action
Get it from SaveThePixel.org now for only £15 - instant delivery in PDF format!

Questions about Web Design & Production?

Share your questions, thoughts, and ideas with the community over at Scratch Web Design Forums »