Responsive Web Design

Welcome back brand builders. Today at the ArtVersion offices we were having a conversation with a new client. We suggested to them that their new website should have RESPONSIVE WEB DESIGN. When we mentioned this we were met with blank stares. This gave me the idea to blog about this subject to our readers.

In 2012, we all know that people use many different devices to browse the internet whether for business or pleasure.  Responsive web design is constructing your web page so that no matter what screen size a visitor is using your website will respond and self adjust to fit that screen size.

The technical process is using W3C CSS3 media queries with fluid proportion-based grids, to adapt the layout to the viewing environment, and probably also flexible images. As a result, users across a broad range of devices and browsers will have access to a single source of content, laid out so as to be easy to read and navigate with a minimum of resizing, panning and scrolling.

Responsive web design is not intended to replace mobile UX design although it can remove the need to design a separate mobile experience, particularly on content-focused sites.

To keep this simple responsive web design is a very different way to design sites but it represents the future. If you want to test a website or see this type of web design in action open a newer website in your browser then slowly make the browser smaller and smaller to the size of your mobile screen if it keeps adjusting to the screen size change then it was designed using responsive web design.

The creator of this type of design is Ethan Marcotte and we recommend reading his article if you’re interested in the more technical aspects of responsive web design. http://www.alistapart.com/articles/responsive-web-design/

If you’re interested in having your current website restructured with a responsive web design or if you’re looking for a brand new site using this as the foundation please contact our ArtVersion team today.