All For One and One For All – Monochromatic Color Schemes in Web Design

All For One and One For All – Monochromatic Color Schemes in Web Design

Monochromatic and grayscale color schemes are not new in web design, but they are still around, and still being used to great effect. It is not unusual to find minimal grayscale web designs these days, and for the purposes of this article I have not included many using that color scheme in this article.

It is often a brave move to use one predominant color in a design, and this can work very well or completely miss the mark! Here we have selected some site designs that use a main color throughout the site effectively.

Web Design Using a Monochromatic Color Scheme

Verde

With such a name, it is no surprise that the landing page is green. If you stay on the landing page, the background and the name change shades, but remain green. The interesting thing about this site is that as you scroll down, the rest of the site is grayscale – unexpected, but clean and beautiful.

Verde

Toomas Tartes

This freelance designer uses a turquoise color throughout his site. There is also a touch of parallax scrolling, and the site is quite minimal in design.

Toomas Tartes

Flavinsky

This is the portfolio of French digital art director Flavien Guilbaud. The whole site is presented in a grayscale color scheme, and each page you visit has a different large number (06 on the home page) – I didn’t quite get what the numbers represent… but perhaps someone will be able to tell me!

Flavinsky

Jacob Grubbe

Large white type on a bold blue background… but when you land on this site there is nothing other than a pink flashing cursor and the words ‘Start typing’ – and you have to to get this page to do anything – it doesn’t matter what you type, but you have to keep typing if you want to see Grubbe’s full bio. A few words are linked using the cursor-pink color – a good site to waste a little time on!

Jacob Grubbe

Jacob Grubbe

Netlife Research

This Norwegian agency use a green color scheme with some noise added for texture. The whole site uses this same background color.

Netlife Research

Cirq

This Californian winemaker uses black and white images with a grungy red text throughout the site.

Cirq

War Child

This UK based charity aims to provide help for children in conflict-affected countries. They have used the same red and black color scheme for some years, although the site design has changed.

War Child

Blank

This art direction and graphic design site uses a pink overlay on all its elements that are presented in a grid-style layout. Many of the images are constantly changing.

Blank

The Nikola Tesla Institutes of Medicine USA

This is the site of the Costa Rican branch of the Nikola Tesla Institutes of Medicine. They use shades of purple and blue throughout the site – it is a slight step away from the usual blue for health sites.

The Nikola Tesla Institute of Medicine USA

Paralotna

This site uses a very bright and bold yellow as the main color scheme for its site design.

Paralotna

Imavex

This digital design and marketing agency uses shades of orange throughout their site, another example of a bold color in web design.

Imavex

Cam O’Connell

Perhaps the inclusion of this site is pushing the point of monochromatic design a little – the landing page is a pinky red color, and every page is a different, but monochromatic color.

Cam O'Connell

ID Neon

This Swiss site uses a slideshow of black and white images on the landing page with large orange type for the text. As you scroll down the page, the same orange is used throughout, and the background is black. There are also some cool scrolling effects.

ID Neon

Crossroads Alliance

Similar to the previous example, this site uses orange on a black background, but they also use a black texture in places to add a little interest to the design.

Crossroads Alliance

Theme Squad

This site uses a paper texture in a pale green color throughout the site. They use a typewriter-style grungy font, making the site seem quite retro in design.

Theme Squad

HAG

This model-making company use a red transparency on a mountainous background image, and further down the page, they use hexagonal links to their products that also use the same background, as well as a location pin. The other images on the page are black and white, and the text is in shades of gray and same red color used on the hero area image.

HAG

Studio Stylistik

This Canadian dance studio uses a black background with a halftone transparency, and touches of blue throughout the site. The end result is a very stylish site to suit their name.

Studio Stylistik

Nutone

This site uses a solid pink color on its landing page with large typographic links to 3 categories on their site. As you scroll down the page it is mainly grayscale with subtle touches of the same pink color.

Nutone

3Coasts

This site is mainly white on green – quite a few different shades of green. Except one section that is black on white with a host of programming labels with green backgrounds.

3Coasts

Mass Effect

This is the only other grayscale site design featured in this round-up. Mass Effect have a very minimal design, very light colors, the hero area image is set on a gray background, and the headline text throughout the page is black, but in a very thin font. The content text is quite a pale gray.

Mass Effect

Humblebee

This one is just for fun! The site is a URL shortening service, and is topically on a bright green background with a stylized bee at the bottom of the page.

Humblebee

Conclusion

Although monochromatic site design is not really trending right now, such designs still pop up from time to time, and the brighter the color, the more unique and attention grabbing it is – for good reasons or bad!

Have you designed a monochromatic site? Do you love the style or hate it with a passion? Please share your links and opinions with us in the section below.

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