Welcome to the new decade in web design!

In the last decade we witnessed new emergences in the world wide web. This new emergence not only marked newer and more innovative applications of the internet and its contents, it also opened up a whole new galaxy of trendy, stylish and useful designs.

And as the decade turns, I see the web design community predicting newer trends in the beginning of 'the teens'.

I have assessed other opinions and am happy to present my predictions for popular design trends for 2010 and beyond:

Oversized logo and header

This is an essential replacement of splash pages. Over-sized logos and headers will deliver key messages to visitors without requiring them to click on anything. It will necessarily target to create a visual impact easily recognised and remembered, especially considering bandwidth speeds have greatly improved.

I have been pushing for this one to take effect in some of my design studies way back in 2005 at another company, but it was not accepted at that point. I'm glad that the web is opening its doors to achieve it now.

Illustrations or hand-drawn designs

We have seen this trend in existence for a while, but not on a mass scale. Web designers across the globe are sure that this trend will become an integral part in web designs for years to come.

Typography

This still has issues. Using different typography in designs and mixing them up is quite experimental so far, and at times very confusing. I can still remember what my design mentor told me back in College to limit my typography to only two types, to maintain the unity and harmony of the design. It will remain a primary experimental part of web design in the years immediately ahead.

Single Page Layouts and Minimalism

With busier schedules, people have less time to surf a website. One page layouts would be one of the main trends in 2010 and beyond. The advent of modal javascripts - either mootools or jquery - has made it easier for developers to create it.

Internal pages can be shown at a one-page glance. However, this trend will largely be effective for personal sites and not for corporate designs.

Box and Magazine Type of Layouts

Brief, precise and consice. No more lengthy about us pages in 2010, but simply a few lines of condensed information about who you are. That's intro boxes and though we'll probably still see a lot of about pages along with it. Magazine style though is predicted largely due to the increase in the migration of more people from orthodox traditional media to online media.

This layout offers familiarity for all those people and also offers contents in a more organised pattern.

Oversized Footers

Footers have definitely changed over the years. It's now yet another zone in web design where contents show up. It will be good for SEO and usability as well. Oversized footers with useful display of contents and designs mixed should also become a trend in 2010.

Icons

This is not a new trend, though stylish icons have been there for quite a while and we all hope they will stay there.

Navigations will be composed mostly of icons and hints.

That sums it up. These are the trends that consensus believes will keep us busy for the coming year.