I have always been drawn to working on colorful website design projects. The first real website I designed was for a health and wellness blog I started back in 2018 called Your Happiness Quest. At the time, I loved writing about body confidence and how to cultivate more happiness in life. It was a bit all over the place, and while the topic is still important to me, I fell out of love with writing about it.

In late 2021 I discovered that you could sell blogs online. I thought this was a great idea because it meant all my work wouldn’t just fizzle into nothing. I was hoping someone would take it and put a new lease of life into it. I went through and removed myself as much as possible because I wasn’t comfortable with someone taking my identity online and upgraded the design while I was at it. Unfortunately, the buyer just took my articles and put them on their own site, so the brand no longer exists, but its design lives on in this post.

Colorful Website Design Project Brief

The website branding was always colorful. I was naturally drawn to these colors as I lack the ability to create a minimalistic design. However, I think this really works for this project because color evokes emotions, and the primary emotion of this brand was all about finding more happiness in life.

Using color in design is vital for communicating a message to the viewer. Different colors innately trigger different emotions in people. This is why it is vital that brands thoughtfully choose the colors they use to represent their core values and messaging.

When designers strategically brand a business, they explore color psychology and consider the audience and brand values. How does the brand want its audience to feel when interacting with them? There is no one-size-fits-all when it comes to choosing colors. Each color is associated with both “positive” and “negative” feelings, so pairing color with images, typography, and iconography are all vital for creating a brand vibe.

Color Psychology Examples

I worked with blue, yellow, orange, and pink in this colorful web design project.

• Blue is often considered a calming color that builds trust but can also be seen as cold. This lighter blue is less serious than a deep royal blue.
• Orange is associated with confidence, friendliness, warmth, and energy, all important emotions for this brand. Interestingly, the flip side of orange is immaturity, frivolity, and sluggishness.
• Yellow is the color of happiness, so it was crucial for this project as it was called “Your Happiness Quest.” It’s also a warm color and is connected with optimism and creativity. Yellow can also be associated with cowardice, fear, and anxiety.
• Pink is a color of balance, creativity, passion, and transformation. Pink can also be considered outrageous and eccentric, which isn’t necessarily bad, depending on who you’re targeting.

The best way to evaluate how people react to your colors is to ask your audience. Design is very subjective based on a person’s upbringing, beliefs, culture, and personal taste. Remember this when asking friends or family for their thoughts on your branding. The brand isn’t necessarily for them; it’s for your audience, so it works best when it’s targeted to them.

In this case, this blog was focused on young women seeking more optimism and joy in their life. In other words, they’re looking for more color, so I wanted the design to reflect that. I wanted this colorful website design project to be light, fun, and feminine.

Finding Design Inspiration

Finding inspiration can be tricky because you don’t want to copy another person’s work accidentally. I usually look to Pinterest for web design inspiration and wanted to see how people blended color into their designs to make them pop. Again, a big part of this involves tuning into your emotions. How does a certain style or element make you feel? Then look at which part of the design draws you into the emotions you’re targeting.

One of the key things I identified was using textures to create a more fun, vibrant feeling, so I wanted to incorporate those elements and add balance to the composition, somewhat breaking up the colors. I then went to Canva to explore different shapes and elements that may work. At first I played with floral designs as I used floral elements in my logo and site iconography, but they all felt too cluttered.

In the end, I liked the contrast between the simple shapes creating texture and the plain blocks of color. A lot of the photographs used featured flowers, so it was through this method that I tied in the floral elements of the brand design down the page.

Website Builder Used

This website was built on WordPress using the OptimizePress Plugin. If you’ve watched me on social or read some of my other posts, you may have noticed I’m not a big fan of WordPress, and this website was the reason why, lol. Don’t get me wrong, I think OptimizePress is a great builder, especially if you’re focused on marketing with funnels it makes data collection a breeze, and it’s affordable. But it didn’t always work well with Bluehost, so use a different host if you’re doing this. Ultimately I was driven up the wall by the whole experience of hosting and plugins being working fine one minute then updating, causing incompatibilities and crashing the whole site (a significant contributing factor to why I decided to sell it).

When I discovered Showit, it was like a dream come true. Hosting and a top-notch builder in one—what more could a girl designing websites ask for? Showit is where this website is built on.

Colorful Website Design Project: Before and After

Check out the TikTok video below to see a comparison of the website before its colorful makeover. I used the same brand colors but added textured backgrounds and bold sections to break up each of the key points and features of the website. I think the result is a unique website design that catches the viewer’s eye and communicates a vibe of fun, playfulness, and joy. What do you think? Let me know in the comments below or over on TikTok :).

@jerrettdigital I do love playing with color. What do you think? #websiteglowup #websiterevamp #beforeandafter #websitedesign #websitedesigner #webdesign #webdesigner #webdesigninspiration #webdesigning #websitedesigning #websitedesignersoftictok #websitedesigns #healthblog #wellnessblog #healthbloggers #bodypositiveblogger #bodyconfidencecoach #colorfuldesign #colourfuldesigns #nzbusinesswoman #nzbusinessowner #nzbusiness #nzbusinesswomen ♬ оригинальный звук – Мария – Stories • SMM • Фриланс

Adrianne Jerrett

Adrianne Jerrett is a yoga-loving self-awareness writer and the founder of Jerrett Digital, a brand identity and design company that creates bold Showit websites for health and wellness professionals and ethical businesses. She helps overwhelmed entrepreneurs shift to being aligned and confident experts, ready to grow their businesses online and boost their positive impact.