My own blog is not nearly as sophisticated as yours, but I can empathize with the desire to generate real content to spur ideas and discussion.

Keep up the good work.

People only come for the glitter once.

Another problem I had was finding a size that would accomodate everyone, not only that but the CSS wouldn’t work well with IE for some reason, only firefox, so just as most other people, I just found a theme (I guess settled on a theme) is more like it.

You did well here. It looks good and works well with your blog!

Ultimately, I spent more time on those UI knick-knacks than the core experience of engaging with the content. I loved the idea of an interactive background and it is something I am very open to trying again. However, the end result was something I was never happy with. In the end, they were distractions as well as a blight to the code-cleanliness of the site. I am happy to see them go.

I think the main feedback I got from the old site was how cluttered it was. I knew that no matter what I did, the sheer amount of content on the home page was always going to come off more cluttered than other blog home pages. That said, there was so much fluff on the old design that I definitely wasn’t aiding in my cause. Removing extra colors and visual elements has helped. In terms of spacing, it definitely is tight, but from my subjective opinion, I feel as though the current iteration is less tight than the old version while gaining an extra 30 pixels of effective horizontal space (more on this later).

What can I say? Congrats on fulfilling a HUGE goal. Redesigning anything that is already good, especially your own work, is no easy stroll in the park.

I will admit that at first, I was very sad to see the slider bars, column color shifts, and graphical stats of the previous site go away. I felt those design elements were great, giving SRD a distinct, quirky personality even though I know you had a completely different opinion about it. Before becoming bummed out to see the old look go, I spent some time this afternoon and evening, exploring the new site. Lets just say that we got acquainted with each other, and are now friends. :-)

I’ve come to realize that the site is still very similar to the former SRD. This familiarity is comforting. What has changed—for the better—is that SRD grew up and became an adult. Stripped of all the misc effects, the look and feel is now direct, sophisticated, functional, and focused upon the content.

The typography treatment in the header is elegant and fits well with this new found maturity. Most importantly, I think it brings depth to the monochromatic color scheme. As a print designer, that is my favorite design element of the site. It keeps a bit of that playful personality that I grew to enjoy on SRD. I am also glad to see the icons have survived the redesign, as well as the distinct grid structure. The only nitpicky question I have is this: Why did you decided to leave so little space between the 3 main columns? They do seem cluttered, especially on the homepage. I’ve always felt that negative space is a significant part of legibility as well as a key to successful hierarchical structures.

Otherwise, this is a successful redesign. I look forward to exploring the site further, as well as reading the new content. Congrats!

I’m happy that you like the current design. My hope is this is the last iteration you will see from this site in a long, long time.

Nice implementation of your theme. Especially, dig the overlays and sliding door effect. Was a big fan of the prior design, as well.

As someone who is not a designer nor coder, I have been dragging my feet on my own blog because of the same concerns you expressed in this post. I ask myself — why should I add more of the sameness to the web?

But, I am encouraged by the efforts being made on the typography front, by the desire by some in the design community to add *editorial direction* to their blog posts, and the general desire to put the idea of craft back into blogs — whether thematically, or by design or by content.

Hopefully, over the next year there will be a *new wave* of blogs or personal sites with stronger author generated content.

Anyway, I’m looking forward to the changes.