I found this blog by accident. It had been sitting untouched for years, a few dozen old posts about type and layout, and a login I’d half forgotten. My first thought was to delete the lot. My second thought was: why not bring it back?
Then a more honest question turned up. Does the world need another design blog?
The honest answer is probably not
There are thousands of design blogs already. Big studios write them. Software companies write them. Design writers with huge followings write them, often better than I ever will. If you want advice on typography, colour theory or the latest trends, you can find it in seconds, from people with far more reach than me.
So no, the world was not waiting for this one.
But that was never really the point
I am not writing this blog to fill a gap in the market. I am writing it because I like design and I like writing about it, and I had a spare blog sitting there doing nothing.
Most of what I do for a living is client work. Websites for small businesses in Harrogate and beyond. That work is good and I enjoy it, but it does not leave much room to think out loud. A brief has a goal. A blog post does not need one.
This is a place for the smaller thoughts. A podcast I liked. A book that changed how I look at layout. A stray idea about accessibility that would not fit in a client meeting. None of it needs to be useful. Some of it might be.
Writing for myself first
I have come to think a blog like this works best when I write it for myself and let other people read over my shoulder, rather than the other way round.
That means some posts will be short. Some will ramble a bit. I will get things wrong, or change my mind about them a few months later. I am fine with that. It is closer to how thinking actually works than most polished content ever is.
A record more than an audience
If I am honest, part of the reason I brought this back is selfish. I like having a record of what I was thinking about at a given point. Looking back through the old posts, I could see exactly what I was reading, what I was worried about, what I thought mattered. That is worth keeping, even if nobody else ever reads it.
If people do read it, and find something useful or just mildly interesting, that is a bonus.
So, does the world need another design blog?
Probably not. But I wanted one anyway, and this one was already sitting here, waiting.
So welcome back to Drew a Designer. Come and read over my shoulder for a while.
