Why Do We Want to Redesign Sites Too Often?

As a designer, I’m rarely with a design for long. Not long after finishing a design, I start feeling an urge to redesign the site again. Give it a month or two and I’ll be playing around in Photoshop, making experimental mockups in what spare time I have. I have to force myself to not launch a new design too quickly.

I know I’m not the only one with this “problem.” Many designers are like me. Collis Ta’eed, co-founder of Envato, has admitted to never being happy with a design for long as well. And Adii, from the number of times he’s redesigned his blog recently, has a similar ailment.

Why? Why do I want to redesign so much? Is it because I’m never happy with the end result? Or am I just addicted to designing? I’m not sure. It’s probably both. Normally I’m not disappointed with a design, though they rarely turn out exactly as imagined, but I just…get bored with them. I want to experiment and try out new styles. I want to play with Photoshop and weave new code.

This seems to be something that plagues a large portion of designers, and other creative people as well. Have you noticed it yourself? Do you want to redesign more often than you should? Why?

This was my entry to Smashing Magazine’s guest author contest. It wasn’t published there, so I’m putting it here now that the coast is clear.

  • http://www.garanew.com Gossip

    For me, a neat and SEO based template is essential, :) Great article.

  • http://www.QuittingTheDayJob.com Quitting The Day Job

    I am the exact same way.  The ONLY way I keep from redesigning a site over and over, is I stop looking at it.  Problem is, I need to update it, so I keep going back.  Just last week, I changed the color scheme of one site 3 times in that week, only to find out that I was dropped from EPN (it was a eBay affiliate site).  

  • http://www.armandbook.com Armand

    That’s right. I do the same way. Usually I don’t feel good with my design even when it have not finished yet.