20 Design Rules You Should Never Break.

     This article lists 20 important designing rules you should never break. The article has simple explanations for what you should never do and how to follow each rule. This article was posted by Mary Stribley, a graduate from Perth University.

The rules are as follows:

1.) Don't Forget To Kern: Space letters appropriately.

2.) Don’t Disregard Readability/Legibility For Aesthetic Reasons: Keep everything colored and well sized. 

3.) Keep Your Line Lengths Short: Keep the readers attention by making sentences small and easy to read.

4.) Have Purposeful Hierarchy: Arrange colors and words to give various elements of the design importance.

5.) Practice Appropriate Word Spacing: This is similar to the first rule but the words should be spaced correctly. 

6.) Use The Correct Alignment: Align everything correctly and use one of the four alignment types: left aligned, right aligned, centered, and justified.

7.) Always Use A Grid: Use a grid to help align elements in the design and as part of your design.

8.) Always Design For Your Audience: If you are making an invitation card then give the card balloons, cake, and confetti. Do not give the card a drab design.

9.) Avoid Widows And Orphans: Move the preceding word down a line to avoid widows and orphans

10.) Have A Logical Color Palette: Color can look very appealing when placed in the right way, and color theory can be applied to create certain atmosphere. 

11.) Have A Consistent Front Palette: Write by using a small selection of word fonts (Stribley recommends around 2-3) to keep everything simple and easily for the eye.

12.) Never Use Display Fonts For Body Copy: Use display fonts for small areas of text to keep it simple and easy to read. Use other fonts for larger bodies of text.

13.) Never Stretch Type: Stretched fonts can ruin the design, so a different font is necessary to fill up the desired space.

14.) Avoid Color Discord: Do not clash colors that do not mix, keep the colors appealing and and easily readable.

15.) Don't Think Of White Space As Empty Space: Do not try to fill every square inch of the canvas with objects, use the empty space as an important tool in design.

16.) Don't Follow Design Trends: Trends can easily bring in popularity, but will eventually fade away. Try to make new designs based on what people like in certain designs and why they like them.  

17.) Use The Right Tools: Always use the right tools to get the job done. An example used is how raster graphics are pixelated when zoomed in enough, and how vector can be scaled to any size without losing its quality.

18.) Consider Your Medium: With design it is important to know what you are working with. Stribley gives an example: words should be on both pages of a book instead of combined to be less appealing. 

19.) Learn The Rules Of Grammar: When writing on the design, keep in mind the rules of grammar to correct any punctuation and spelling errors.

20.) Don't Use Too Many Effects: Effects may be a blast to play with, but there is a such thing as too many effects. Do not go overboard and use simple designs when needed.

These rules are straight forward, easy to follow, and are important to any designer. As a bonus, I think it is worth noting that many of Stribley's 20 rules are on grammar, punctuation, spelling, and word placement, all of these are very important but many forget to follow the rules of English.