Ideas and trends
Trends, history and inspiration for your next design.
200 guides · 11 topics
Ideas and trendsGradient trends 2026: six directions worth using
7 min read
Gradients did not go away this year. They got quieter, grainier, darker and more personal. Here are the directions that hold up, each with a look you can copy.
Ideas and trendsGraphic design trends 2026 worth using, and how to use them
6 min read
Four big directions are shaping design this year. Each can make a brand feel current, and each can date it by next spring. Here is how to tell the difference.
Ideas and trendsA short history of gradients in design
7 min read
Colour blends are older than screens, fell out of fashion almost overnight and came back stronger. Here is how the gradient travelled from painted skies to living backgrounds.
Ideas and trendsThe Y2K aesthetic: chrome, gradients and glow
6 min read
Liquid chrome, translucent plastic, ice blue and bubblegum pink: the look of the turn of the millennium is back. Here is how it works, and how to wear it without looking like fancy dress.
Ideas and trendsVaporwave colors and synthwave palettes, with hex codes
6 min read
Pastel pink, cyan and lilac for vaporwave, a glowing sun on a black grid for synthwave. Every palette here comes with codes you can copy, and with the judgement to use it well.
Ideas and trendsNature color palettes from sunsets, oceans and forests
6 min read
Nature never uses pure colour, and that is why its palettes feel so easy to live with. Here are sunsets, coasts, forests, deserts and winter light, each with codes and a gradient you can copy.
Ideas and trendsGradient ideas for twelve industries, with codes
6 min read
A café should not look like a bank, and a bank should not look like a nightclub. Twelve industries, twelve gradients built for their mood, and the design each one does best.
Ideas and trendsMinimalism vs maximalism: choosing a design direction
6 min read
Minimal and maximal are not opposites you must pick between for ever. They are two ways of spending attention, and the best work usually spends it in one place at a time.
Ideas and trendsSwiss design: the grid, the type and how to use it today
6 min read
Swiss design gave graphic design its grid, its love of sans-serif type and its habit of letting structure do the talking. It is still the fastest route to layouts that look calm and certain.
Ideas and trendsEditorial design for social posts: magazine ideas that work
7 min read
Magazines solved the problem of making dense ideas easy to read long before feeds existed. Their devices translate almost directly to posts, carousels and stories.
Ideas and trendsRetro gradients: seventies sunsets to nineties screens
5 min read
Mustard and rust stripes, neon on black, teal and purple and title bar blue. Three decades of retro gradients with codes, and the small changes that make them feel new.
Ideas and trendsGradient art: abstract pieces for walls and screens
6 min read
A gradient on its own can be a finished artwork: a field of colour you live with rather than read. Here is how to make pieces that hold up on a wall, on a screen and as a set.