White Space is Your Friend, Really!

OK, so lately I’ve been seeing some publications and advertisements that are trying to dominate … no, let’s be more clear … *kill* any remnant of white space in the layout of the design and content. No, I don’t mean actual white colored space although I have to say that often times, it is literally white space. I am, however, referring to space on the page that is purposefully not utilized and left clear of content.

I thought we were friends with white space??? When did things go so wrong that white space is now being ousted whenever possible?

Good form requires some white space. Period. When you try to cram so much information into the real estate of an ad or of a page, not only is it message-overload but it also ruins the clean lines of your design’s form.

I was recently told by a magazine designer that he purposefully tries to use up as much white space as possible on every single page. He indicated he has seen how higher-end magazines use white space in nice, sophisticated layouts but he ignores those “white space trends” saying he needs all the room he can get to publish content in as much space as possible.

Well, I do understand the need to have more room but couldn’t there be a nicer, more yin-yang balance? White space is critical for legibility and for good form. When you crowd content all together, you lose the visual aesthetics the eye needs and wants to follow the message along. I would highly recommend you use some white space rather than none. Make an effort to play with layout and typographic elements to strike the right balance of content and clean lines. Your marketing materials will look so much cleaner and better, I absolutely guarantee it.

So to all you white space haters out there, Gloria Estefan says it best with her smash hit song, “Coming out of the dark.” Don’t you finally see the light now? I say … befriend the white space, make peace with it and don’t jam it with tons of junk. The use of white space in an intelligent design will give your marketing materials an instant beauty makeover and new appeal that will have you breaking ties with your your jam-cram design approach for
good!

Tags | design

Mayra Ruiz Mcpherson

Brand Journalist and Digital Strategist Mayra Ruiz-McPherson is founder of Ruiz McPherson Communications (RMC), a marketing ingenuity practice based in Herndon, Virginia. Mayra — who also founded and launched the online career community SocialMediaJobsDC.com — often presents various digital and social media-focused topics tailored to business owners and senior-level marketing managers. She also instructs a number of courses, workshops and training sessions as well as provides private, on-site training on social media tools and strategies.

In between professional engagements, Mayra guest blogs and contributes content regularly to a number of publications both in and outside the Washington DC metro area. Mayra is also the editor of The Better Social Business Blog, "Pet Tech" columnist for the Virginia Maryland Dog Magazine, contributes an “e-Trends” column to the Loudoun Business Journal and is founder of the Loudoun Fairfax Local Bloggers Meetup group which mentors and helps local bloggers network, learn and exchange ideas.