Minimalist Design - Sunday Reflection

The past year has brought some incredible leaps in a minimalist look in application design. It seems somewhat related to The New Aesthetic; which is the result of mixing the digital world with the physical one.
The trend can be seen throughout Google's ecosystem. Android has become sleek and dark, while it's web sites have become high contrast and simple. Even the YouTube player has become very simple, ditching it's subtle gradients for a plain matte gray.

Microsoft has also embraced the style in its newly released Windows 8. The chrome and bloat from Windows 7 is (mostly) gone, leaving you with straight lines, high contrast colors, and few distracting graphics.
As technology becomes more and more a part of our lives, this will hopefully become more common. By stripping away the graphics and the visual candy software becomes much more understandable and usable.

Advantages of Minimalist Design

• No time spent wondering what icons do.
• Less time worrying about visual consistancy.
• Your software ages far better.
• Less work maintaining software.