You’ve re-opened a can of worms for me, Mark, and I’m glad you did. I started to writea comment with my thoughts on these matters, but it quickly started to take the shape of an article, so I’ll be posting it on my own site very soon. Apparently I need a good kick in the pants to do any writing these days, so thanks for that!

Good luck with the talk in Berlin; I really wish I could be there for it.

One of the divers of this separation is that a lot of content is coming out of a database, and the designer doesn’t really know what the content might be. We’ve “abstracted up” to where we might know something of the “type” of content, of the “style” of content, but nothing more. And we can always be surprised when something unexpected shows up that is outside of our design vision.

When I designed Handmeon.com, I took the metaphor of an “illustrated book,” hoping that readable type, with vertical rhythm and generous room for photos would encourage and promote thoughtful writing. It’s much too early to tell on this project (barely out of alpha), but the initial results are promising. First take a look at the site, then review the RSS feed (auto-discovery link) to see the content independent of the presentation.

This idea of looking at the RSS feed as a way to evaluate the implicit design goals of a project may be a useful way of measuring success (over a fairly long time horizon).

I definitely agree that typography needs to be addressed throughout the web development process.

I am a developer by day, and designer in my spare time.  I have recently completed a course in typography and have become extremely excited about what can be achieved visually with good typographic decisions.

I am usually handed a design that needs to be turned into a website template. Often times only the surface is scratched with these two page Photoshop mockups as far as typography goes.

Luckily for the designers I work with I have begun to get an understanding of typography and try my best to stay true to their vision (by asking questions and filling in where I can).  I know that this isn’t commonplace in the world of web developers, but hopefully one day it will be.

It is crucial to include developers in the process, otherwise projects like Smartypants and Typogrify would never have come to pass.

Do you think that this problem is due to the increase in demand for content management systems as hinted at in Michael J’s comment?

If a client wishes to be able to add/edit/delete content at the click of a button, then you, as the designer, will never have total ownership (creative) of the real design. You can merely guide and suggest, or take ownership to tidy-up after the client has made changes to get it back to the beginning state or idea that you originally intended.

I think that in any design work compromises will always be made to meet myriad of requirements; cost (being the ultimate), time, technology and many others.

The great thing about the web is that it can be quickly changed at little cost and that is why it has been so successful. Imagine blogging on a flyer campaign! Your typography would be beautiful, I’m sure, but your bank manager wouldn’t give a shit!

I certainly see where you’re coming from. For years I’ve been preaching the gospel of Form follows Function follows Content.

And still people keep designing templates for database content, filling them with lorem ipsum. Doing balancing acts with fake content, to make everything picture perfect.

Most content doesn’t change that often, that you actually can do good editorial design with it. CMS has become yet another acronym to hide behind.

These days I show my clients abriefmessage.com, hoping that soon the web will flourish with designed content instead of nicely framed content.

good copy is a start, after you as a designer have the power to present that copy in the best possible way. Though good copy is rather an exception than the rule. It is not only typograpy , but can be both imagery and typography. It is about semiotics.

Good copy is as important as structuring and emphasing that copy that leads to better comprehension of the contectual message, connotations and the denoted message. Obvious!!

Is the conecptual separation of content and design really the cause of the “icing on the cake"-issue? In my experience, things become problematic when Garrett’s formal description of the “planes of user experience” get rolled out as a linear project flow (which happens way too often).
When visual design is the last station on the project-conveyor-belt, a “theme” or “skin” is probably the only thing that’s left to do.
Formal separation of content and design or no, the way to go seems to be to get the visual designers involved with the information architects from the start - and maybe allow a coder in the room for good measure.

in the olden days of paper, the job of the typographer
was to use the presentation to elucidate the content…

indeed, like background music in a film, the job was to
communicate the structure implicitly, subconsciously…

which means that one can also understand the structure
of the content by careful examination of its typography.

i encounter this all the time when looking at image-sets
of books that’ve been scanned, and laugh at the people
who consider content and presentation as dual entities,
just because that is a model they now wish to impose…

you can think of love and sex separately if you want, too,
but you miss a lot of the point when you do it that way…

-bowerbird

Interesting conclusions!

Excellent post. On a related point, I’ve been bemoaning the stripping-down of content even further as we peer into web content through feed readers. I use Google reader every day and I’ve lost all sight of what (if anything) a site is trying to convey beyond the raw content. It’s all the same font with the same breakdown. I wrote at length about it here:

http://www.basement.org/2007/10/if_the_web_is_tv_then_rss_is_r.html

Art Direction doesn’t happen on the web ! Business Week: Jeffrey Zeldman: King of Web Standards http://www.webstandards.org/2007/08/07/business-week-jeffrey-zeldman-king-of-web-standards/

Well absolutely interesting this theory as much as difficult to apply to a normal website…

Well I think it is a problem apply a different style to different type of contents in a site ... for the question Micheal J say in his comment (I mean content generated from a DB) and also because would be horrible apply a different style on different page of same website…

I think it is much better than navigator can choose style of the site ... and adapt it to his way to see this website (I mean ... change color, font or template of the site)

Hey hey,

Hope you don’t mind if I jump in on the discussion mate, I have a question!

What do you suggest we can do to change things for the better, when it comes to pushing for typographical consideration throughout the design of a project?

Sometimes the structure of a project might prevent all the efforts in the world, regardless of how we might want to improve the situation.

In large organisations I guess this would involve introducing a specialist into the mix, but I’m not sure how to achieve the same benefit in a smaller team.

Do we try to cross-train everyone?

Without trying to delve into too much history (well, maybe I am..). This, to me, resembles the debate over the different design influences of the past half century.

Whilst modernist designers (particularly regarding the Swiss/International ‘style’ of design) will ultimately look to convey the message in the most effective manner possible, others will argue that the attractiveness of the design is what will attract the reader, and from there they would have already been enticed to read the content.

wolfgang Weingart once argued that the relatively high stimulus of some of his designs made up for there illegibility. Whilst Weingart’s work is somewhat different to the web
, I see this as a tactic still employed on the web.

Personally, I agree with you wholeheartedly, and would love to see more typographic discipline on the web, but sadly I feel it is some time away yet, especially with the popularity of content management systems (and ‘themes’) making the task even harder.

Great post though.

Kev