It’s important to train an eye for good design to develop as a designer. Here are some tips and resources to help you build this habit.
Designers are like poker players: the more hands you’ve seen, the better you play. Developing an eye for design should become your regular exercise. You’d better stick to a firm schedule to make it a habit.
For instance, I spend 30 minutes a day checking out new stuff on Dribbble and Behance, visiting the websites of my favorite studios once a week, and going through new collections of brand identity and typography once a month.
To automate this routine, I’m using a combination of browser bookmarks and the Tab Snooze extension for Chrome.
Here’s how I automated my weekly visits to design studios’ and agencies’ websites. First, I created the Studios & Agencies folder in my Google Chrome Bookmarks and filled it with bookmarks to the sites I want to revisit from time to time (the links are below). Then, I set up Tab Snooze to pop up this folder for me at noon every Friday.
That’s it. The folder appears on my display every Friday at 12:00 p.m. All I need to do is click through the links and explore new content.
Similarly, I get reminders about the other resources I chose to develop my eye for good design.
Bonus: Useful links
As a product designer, I regularly visit the following four categories of websites:
- Product teams
- Studios and agencies
- Galleries and collections
- Related disciplines
Product teams
- Airbnb • Instagram
- Asana • Dribbble
- Atlassian • Dribbble
- Avocode • Dribbble
- Evernote • Dribbble
- Facebook • Dribbble
- Godaddy • Dribbble
- Google • Dribbble
- IBM • Dribbble
- Intercom • Dribbble
- InVision • Dribbble
- Lyft • Dribbble
- Mailchimp • Dribbble
- Marvel • Dribbble
- Microsoft • Dribbble
- Pitch • Dribbble
- Shopify • Dribbble
- Slack • Dribbble
- Squarespace • Dribbble
- Stripe • Dribbble
- Uber • Dribbble, Behance
- Webflow • Dribbble
- Zendesk • Dribbble
Studios & Agencies
- Anton & Irene
- Base
- Clay • Dribbble
- COLLINS • Instagram
- Cuberto • Pinterest
- Fantasy
- Focus Lab • Dribbble
- Hybrid Design • Pinterest, Behance
- IDEO • Pinterest
- MetaLab • Dribbble
- Olle • Dribbble, Behance
- Pentagram • Pinterest, Behance
- Sagmeister & Walsh • Pinterest
- SFCD
- Siegel+Gale
- Spiilka • Dribbble, Behance
- Ueno • Dribbble
- Unfold • Dribbble
- Wolff Olins
- Work & Co
Galleries and collections
- Mobbin • mobile app references
- Design Pattrns • mobile app references (paywall warning)
- Land-book • landing pages
- Really Good Emails • e-mail design references
- Email Gallery • e-mail design references
- Site Inspire • website references
Related disciplines
- Brand New • brand identity designs
- Pentawards • best package design award
- The Dieline • package design references
About the author
Aleksey Popov, product designer and maker
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