Design Trends 2018

18 Jan Design Trends 2018

Step away minimalism, white space and sans serifs. 2018 is the year of boldness, risk and pushing boundaries. With bright colours, bespoke illustration and typography, the rise of GIFS and cinemagraphs, brands are becoming more adventurous and designers are eager to break out and play with colour this New Year.

Bespoke handwritten and bold typography

In the aftermath of highly minimal trends, bold and handwritten fonts will be used in 2018 to make an impact. Bold, bespoke typography will help content jump off the page from websites to traditional print and social media.

Duotones

Layering a limited, yet strong colour palette on imagery and branding creates a beautiful, unique and in the tone of 2018: bold effect. Some brands such as Spotify have mastered this technique already.

Bold colours and unconventional combinations

Breaking away from the clean, white, and what some consider boring minimalistic design of 2016 and 2017 using bold colours in interesting combinations will be in this year. With Pantone’s breakout colour ‘Ultra Violet’ setting the tone of risk, inspiration and energy.

Colour transitions and gradients

When Instagram first changed their logo to include a gradient, there were plenty of WordArt jokes. But, they seemed to be onto something; with an emergence of gradients we’re set to see the trend take off in 2018.

Illustrations

Illustrations will have a powerful impact in 2018, similar to that of handwritten typography. An original hand drawn illustration is attention grabbing for a number of reasons including that it’s original content, one of a kind – helping it to stand out from the crowd and in the digital world there is something wholesome and special about seeing a hand drawn picture or illustration– even on a screen.

GIFs

GIF’s are great for communicating feelings, for a bit of a joke, and are great for reactions. In 2018 we’ll see the GIF evolve, moving away from just memes to useful visuals that are unique, give life to your newsfeed and capture attention. A similar concept called cinemegraphs is looking to grow too. This involves a still photograph where there is only one area of the image that is subtly moving.