30+ Must-have Design Resources

As both a graphic and web designer, I tend to bookmark tons of sites as I stumble upon them (no pun intended, StumbleUpon.) I have narrowed it down to a little more than the thirty best links that I have found. Each and everyone of these resources I use on almost a daily basis to help me out with ideas, brushing up on my skills, or just to look at great designers work.

This is by no means a full list, as I am always finding new and exciting sites to add to my bookmarks. If you feel there are other sites that I (and the readers) should look into, please feel free to add a comment and let me know about them. I always get excited when I find something interesting to read.

Overall Resources:

Smashing Magazine – Freebies/tutorials/inspiration/etc
DesignFloat – Community-submitted design links
DesignBump – More community-submitted design links
GoMediazine – Tips, tutorials, and advice from designers

Inspiration:

DesignFlavr – Very good quality design inspiration
Creattica – Inspiration from great designers all over the web
Pattern Tap – Screenshot sharing of web-based inspiration
Scrnshots – Community-submitted screenshots of inspiration
Stationerystyle – Stationary inspiration, such as business cards and brochures
Deviantart – One of the first inspirational sites, but still always a great resource

Blogs:

Spoon Graphics – Chris Spooner’s excellent design blog
Outlaw Design Blog – The genius thinking of Danny Outlaw
Freelance Switch – Everything and anything freelance design related
Dev Snippets – Web design/development articles
Mac Appstorm – Mac program/app reviews

Tutorials:

Psd Tuts+ – Photoshop tutorials
Net Tuts+ – Web Design tutorials
Vector Tuts+ – Illustrator tutorials
w3Schools – Tutorials for every type of web design
Abduzeedo – Great totorials, as well as inspiration, and freebies

Other Resources:

Icon Finder – Icon search done very easy and sexy
PHP Form – Free HTML Form Builder
TypeChart – Beautiful site to browse web type options.
Vecteezy – Download free vector graphics and vector art

Great posts:

45 Sets of Seamless Vector Patterns
50 Beautiful and Creative Portfolio Designs
Web Design Tutorials: the Ultimate Roundup
35 Excellent Websites for Downloading Free CSS Templates
40 Source to Download High-Quality Free Photoshop PSD Stuff
50 Free High Quality and New XHTML/CSS Templates
30 High-Quality Icon Sets for E-Commerce Designs

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sharing is caring lee gustin creative designs

StumbleUpon.) I have narrowed it down to a little more than the thirty best links that I have found.

Pliggs

August 8, 2009 at 11:09 am

Excellent roundup. I use http://www.faqpal.com as well as Design Bump.

[Reply]

Martti

February 14, 2013 at 6:18 pm

Hello and thank you for the links!
I wanted to add shamless plug to my graphics blog where I collect beautiful design work all cited to the original studios. Take a look, I hope you find as much inspiration in browsing as I do in collecting it.