Do Web Design Trends Even Exist?

So here we are in 2009 and it’s my first post of the year. The big talking point across most of the popular design blogs and industry magazines seems to be what trends will emerge in 2009? I have to admit, it was initially something I wanted to post about, but having now given it more thought – I’m not even sure that trends exist in the way they are made out to.

A quick search for web design trends will return you a huge amount of results. Many of these show examples of these so called trends in use – big fonts, photographic backgrounds, handwritten fonts to name but a few. It’s very easy to focus on a particular element of a website you like and to find other websites that also do this (the countless css galleries out there will help you out), but that to me is more indicative of the scale of the web design industry than of designers jumping on a particular style bandwagon.

Of course, we operate in a very fast developing industry and technology will play it’s part in dictating some of the guidelines but design to me is not about trends, it’s about solutions. It’s about finding the best possible solution to the brief regardless of current techniques and trends.