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Whitespace is nothing.

Posted by on 13th Oct 2007 Design & Coding 4 comments

White space, despite it’s name, has nothing to do with colour. Whitespace is elegant, whitespace is excess, whitespace is nothing.

Whitespace is the space between graphics, margins, space between columns, space between lines of type or figures and objects. But whitespace is not just ‘blank’ space; this balance of negative and positive space is key to design. Content needs room to breath, otherwise it appears crowded, feels cramped and can even strain the eye. Too much whitespace though, can make the design seem incomplete. 

The proper amount of whitespace depends on the application. Giving content plenty of whitespace gives a rich luxurious feeling, and can draw the readers attention in otherwise crowded layouts. However, less breathing room for elements can be used to brand lower class items, differentiating them from luxury items.  It takes a good eye and plenty of practice to determine how much is too little or too much, but practice makes perfect.
After all, whitespace is everything. Filling up every nook and cranny above the fold with information isn’t ideal unless your a classifieds section or the yellow pages.  Take a look at some of the more high end brands, and popular minimalist designs, examine the whitespace, and go from there.

John Leschinski is the creative director and founder of Leschinski Design. John's skill and talent is sought after by large and small companies and organizations, both local to the Rainy River district, London Ontario, and globaly. His experience and knowledge are also used in classrooms to groom the next generation of web developers and business seminars discussing e-commerce and the value of good design.

4 comments - Leave a reply
  • Posted by Israel on 14th Oct 2007

    thats a very good point. look at apple.

  • Posted by chinnee on 15th Oct 2007

    agree with you on the white area. I love white too, it makes the blog looks neater and pleasant to the eyes :)

  • Posted by Ravi on 9th Jan 2008

    My favorite use of whitespace is when you have an image with a white background inserted on a site with a white background…it looks like the image is actually on the page, rather than a photo/pic of it.

    To get an idea of what I mean, look no farther than the smiley icons above this comment box!