I've seen #BrutalistWebdesign quite frequently this year and I think, they mostly get it wrong.
David Copeland, the author of the guidelines you linked to, actually explains what brutalism is about and tries to adapt its philosophy onto a website. The result is a plain, white, easy to use document, and it works really well. The core statement is that unstyled documents are mostly fine as they are. Each CSS property that's applied to the document needs a very good reason to be there.
However most websites featured on brutalistwebsites.com go the other way and apply retro designs and design antipatterns just for the sake of being edgy. The user is not in focus anymore, the designer is. It's the exact opposite of brutalism.
While I love seeing weird, retro, anti-design websites and exploring their sometimes unexpected behaviour, brutalism is the wrong headline.
I hadn’t realized this was a thing! I went on a tirade a little while ago and built “the simplest website that could possibly work”. Heavy focus on the content and blazing fast page loads (because it’s mostly just HTML and a few bytes of uncompressed CSS). One of my big rules is that it has to render in the Lynx browser. If my site doesn’t work in the terminal, a screen reader won’t fair well either, so it’s broken. +100
My name is Lewis Menelaws. I am a developer and entrepreneur located in Sarnia, Ontario focusing on creating great things for the web. Currently I am Lead Developer and Co-Founder of TMRRWinc.
I've seen #BrutalistWebdesign quite frequently this year and I think, they mostly get it wrong.
David Copeland, the author of the guidelines you linked to, actually explains what brutalism is about and tries to adapt its philosophy onto a website. The result is a plain, white, easy to use document, and it works really well. The core statement is that unstyled documents are mostly fine as they are. Each CSS property that's applied to the document needs a very good reason to be there.
However most websites featured on brutalistwebsites.com go the other way and apply retro designs and design antipatterns just for the sake of being edgy. The user is not in focus anymore, the designer is. It's the exact opposite of brutalism.
While I love seeing weird, retro, anti-design websites and exploring their sometimes unexpected behaviour, brutalism is the wrong headline.
(I know, I must be fun at partys)
Sounds a lot like this random guy I found on twitter.
Roman Zolotarev
I hadn’t realized this was a thing! I went on a tirade a little while ago and built “the simplest website that could possibly work”. Heavy focus on the content and blazing fast page loads (because it’s mostly just HTML and a few bytes of uncompressed CSS). One of my big rules is that it has to render in the Lynx browser. If my site doesn’t work in the terminal, a screen reader won’t fair well either, so it’s broken. +100
I love your fair take on it :). You are welcome to every single one of my parties. (don't forget the pizza)