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The web design industry is continuously changing and there are many people who are setting the bar higher every day with their incredible work and contribution to the web design community. Here is a list of just a few of the people who are responsible for changing the meaning of web design with their awesome work and concepts. All designers listed here are equally amazing, this isn’t mean to be a ‘Top Ten’ type list, we’re not ranking them, just listing innovators in web design.
Also, with this list I have shared their Facebook, Twitter, Dribbble & LinkedIn information so you can always stay connected and get inspired by their work.
Jeffery Zeldman is the King of Web Standards & co-founded The Web Standards Project. Zeldman was one of the first bloggers and independent publishers. He has written design books like “Designing With Web Standards”& “Taking Your Talent to the Web”.
Website: http://www.zeldman.com/
Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/zeldman
Facebook: http://facebook.com/JeffreyZeldman
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/zeldman
Dribbble: N/A
2. Jason Santa Maria
Jason is a creative director for Typekit & founder of Typedia. Inspired by traditional print design and typography, he has worked with WordPress, Miramax Films, The New York Stock Exchange, PBS and many others.
Website: http://jasonsantamaria.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/jasonsantamaria
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/jasonsantamaria
LinkedIn: N/A
Dribbble: http://dribbble.com/jsm
Dan is a designer, author, and speaker and a co-founder of Dribbble. He is know as a CSS guy. He’s worked with some of the heaviest hitters in the web industry including: Google, YouTube, Blogger and many more.
Website: http://simplebits.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/simplebits
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/simplebits
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/simplebits
Dribbble: http://dribbble.com/simplebits
Vitaly is a founder of Smashing Magazine which is one the largest online design magazines on the web. They regularly publish really high quality articles that help designers and developers across the world.
Website: http://www.smashingmagazine.com
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/smashingmag
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/vitaly.friedman
LinkedIn: http://de.linkedin.com/pub/vitaly-friedman/4/126/40
Dribbble: N/A
John is a talented designer from the UK and is working as a member of the WordPress UI Team, he is also developing user interface for Virgin Atlantic Airways. Besides his personal blog, he also contributes to Smashing Magazine, Web Designer Depot and Envato Network.
Website: http://john.onolan.org/
Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/johnonolan
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/johnonolan
LinkedIn: http://uk.linkedin.com/in/johnonolan
Dribbble: http://dribbble.com/JohnONolan
Brian is a graphic designer who focuses on corporate identity & branding. His recent project includes redesigning Mojo Themes. Inspired by typography and layout, Brian focuses on usability & design.
Website: http://www.thedesigncubicle.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/behoff
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/TDCBehoff
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/brianwhoff
Dribbble: http://dribbble.com/behoff
Douglas founded Stopdesign under which he worked with Google, Capegemini, Blogger & other big clients. Later, he worked at Google as a Visual Design Lead and after that he moved on to work with Twitter as its creative director.
Website: http://stopdesign.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/stop
Facebook: N/A
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/stopd
Dribbble: http://dribbble.com/stop
Aarron is a designer, author, professor and speaker. He is the lead user experience designer for MailChimp. He also leads the development of the InterACT curriculum project that helps connect the design industry & education.
Website: http://aarronwalter.com/
Twitter:http://twitter.com/#!/aarron
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/aarronwalter
LinkedIn: N/A
Dribbble: N/A
Ethan is a passionate designer, speaker and wrote ‘Handcrafted CSS’. New York Magazine, Stanford University, and the World Wide Web Consortium are some of the clients he has worked with. Ethan can be found blogging about design-related articles on his blog.
Website: http://ethanmarcotte.com/
Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/BEEP
Facebook: N/A
LinkedIn: N/A
Dribbble: N/A
10. David Airey
David works from a Northern Ireland-based home studio, he is a brand identity designer who has worked with clients of all sizes. His client list include Giacom and Yellow Pages. He writes on design at Logo Design Love and davidairey.com. He also authored the book ‘Logo Design Love’.
Website: http://www.davidairey.com/
Twitter:http://twitter.com/#!/DavidAirey
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/davidaireydesign
LinkedIn: http://uk.linkedin.com/in/davidairey
Dribbble: N/A
11. Patrick McNeil
Patrick is more of a developer than a designer but he has contributed equally to the design community. He has been featured in .NET Magazine and authored the book series “The Web Designer’s Idea Book”.
Website: http://pmcneil.com/
Twitter:http://twitter.com/#!/DesignMeltdown
Facebook:http://www.facebook.com/people/Patrick-McNeil/764310713
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/patrickmcneilstl
Dribbble: N/A
Jason is a user experience designer and front-end developer with a degree in Graphic Design. He is currently working as a user experience designer at MailChimp and also authored the book ‘The Principles of Beautiful Web Design’. He has also spoken at many SXSW events.
Website: http://jasongraphix.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/jasongraphix
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/jbeaird
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/jasongraphix
Dribbble: N/A
13. Chris Coyier
Chris is currently working at Wufoo, he is the founder of CSS-Tricks which shares tons of useful tutorials and tips. He has also co-authored the famous book Digging into WordPress.
Website: http://chriscoyier.net/
Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/chriscoyier
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/chriscoyier
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/chriscoyier
Dribbble: N/A
Eric is the author of ‘CSS: The Definitive Guide’. He has been working with the web since 1993 and is an expert of HTML & CSS. He is also a co-founder of An Event Apart & GMPG.
Website: http://meyerweb.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/meyerweb/
Facebook: N/A
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/meyerweb
Dribbble: N/A
Luke worked as the Chief Design Architect at Yahoo and was the Lead User Interface Designer of eBay. He has authored two design books and is currently the Chief Product Officer and co-founder of Bagcheck Inc.
Website: http://www.lukew.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/lukew
Facebook: http://www.linkedin.com/in/lukew
LinkedIn: N/A
Dribbble: N/A
Let us know about the designer you are influenced by and tell us which of the designer listed here you like the most.
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Nikunj is a computer engineer by profession, mobile photographer by heart & quick learner of new things related to software & technology. Loves web designing & development. Visit His Blog Weby Life | Follow Him On Twitter
Monday, May 16th, 2011 22:14
I only know of a few of them… and I agree with the comment above, we need a woman in this list :)
Monday, May 16th, 2011 12:00
Great list, but where are the girls. Its quite depressing for our sex to not be mentioned anywhere
Monday, May 16th, 2011 10:20
Another very influential is Tantek Çelik
Monday, May 16th, 2011 12:17
Hongkiat of Hongkiat.com is one of my favorite! He self-built an highly trafficked design blog.
Sunday, May 15th, 2011 19:58
Well, first I must say it is a great list. I’m missing Andy Clark on the list, but since he is more CSS expert i understand : )
I’ll join the others and mention that we are missing female designers on the list.
hmm…this is my candidate : )
Suzanne Ginsburg
Designer & Author of ‘Designing the iPhone User Experience.’
She also runs the great Touchy Talk blog.
@suzanneginsburg
Tuesday, May 17th, 2011 00:15
Thanks for suggesting the female designer will take into consideration while making the list in future.
Sunday, May 15th, 2011 03:57
Cool list! How come there’s no woman? ohh..any female geeks out there?
Sunday, May 15th, 2011 15:53
When I was writing the post I did not know I was missing something, maybe I would write another post delicately just for women & I have missed out some people in the list so that not to make it a large list & also few of them were really unknown to me
Saturday, May 14th, 2011 12:42
What? Collis ta’eed not on the list.
Friday, May 13th, 2011 22:06
Eric Meyer 14th? Who even wrote this list?
Saturday, May 14th, 2011 02:52
Top 15 and all men. There’s something not quite fair about this.
Friday, May 13th, 2011 20:34
Cool list! Where’s the chicks?! lol
Saturday, May 14th, 2011 02:17
Chris Coyier is my man! I’ve been following this guy blog CSS Tricks for some months and it’s been helping alot to improve my CSS skills.
Besides there are alot of great famous people here I’d never dreamed of getting to know them. Thanks so much for sharing it! Cya around!
Friday, May 13th, 2011 22:56
Not even one women??
Friday, May 13th, 2011 14:33
I’m surprised and a little refreshed by the number of N/A’s on the account lists. It makes me feel better for choosing not to be on every fly-by-night social site when these guys aren’t even on Facebook of Dribble.
Thanks for the list!
Friday, May 13th, 2011 13:34
Great list. I would also add fellow Canadians Jesse Bennett-Chamberlain (www.31three.com) and Mike Precious (www.mikeprecious.com).
Friday, May 13th, 2011 12:38
Jeffery Zeldman is the man! Basically the Godfather of the internet!
Friday, May 13th, 2011 16:19
The only name I noticed that didn’t make the list is Dominic Leodoro. He’s a web guru out of Chicago and owns a small web design/online marketing company called web2night. I think he keeps a low profile though.
Friday, May 13th, 2011 16:19
I can’t believe Cameron Moll didn’t make that list.
Friday, May 13th, 2011 15:07
Thanks, very insightful. I have worked through some of Eric Meyer’s training courses on lynda.com. But where oh where are the women in this list? Let this be a challenge to all the brilliant female geeks out there!
Friday, May 13th, 2011 14:07
Vitaly Friedman is my fav who is a talented web designer, i love his all posts on his website…
Friday, May 13th, 2011 13:58
I like Chris Coyier and his screencasts. He is a CSS / WordPress /JS guru …
Browsing the guys websites, I’ve ended up on webstandardssherpa.com. I love the carousel / slider on the homepage. Has any one any idea how it’s made?
Good article, thanks.
Friday, May 13th, 2011 13:21
Oh no! You missed Jon Tangerine and Harry Roberts.
Friday, May 13th, 2011 12:31
OH, where’s PAUL IRISH???
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Jared Hallal
Tuesday, May 17th, 2011 03:41
David Yeiser of designintellection.com
Valpo
Tuesday, May 17th, 2011 03:32
Yep, no women on the list, someone will always have something to say about it.. Title 9
Alex Patin
Thursday, May 26th, 2011 21:30
I was going to say, I better see Brian Hoff’s name on this list! I love all of these guys – probably about half of everything that I know is due to these awesome people. It’s not just practice they teach…it’s theory. Something you can’t get anywhere else but experience, and boy do they have that experience.
I only hope one day I can be as successful as these guys!
Rob Brawn
Tuesday, May 24th, 2011 18:04
Great article, some really interesting people to know about in the web design community.
Thanks
Chris Anderson
Sunday, May 22nd, 2011 21:43
Norm Augustinus without question should have been on this list.
CF
Saturday, May 21st, 2011 14:53
You might want to take the time to spell Jeffrey Zeldman’s name right, too.
Julia
Saturday, May 21st, 2011 15:00
I don’t disagree with a single name on this list, some are personal heroes of mine, but dude, you couldn’t find one freakin’ female to add even as a token?
aditia
Wednesday, June 8th, 2011 15:29
is Vitaly Friedman a designer too? to be influential we do not have to be designer itself
Diane
Thursday, August 11th, 2011 04:05
Why all male? Where is the females?
Duarte Nunes
Monday, January 2nd, 2012 12:18
Hello Diane,
Agree, how about the female minds of Web Design?
Dion Evans
Wednesday, January 25th, 2012 20:00
Hey there, The list is great and I like all of them and intent on Twitter following several of them. I am new to WordPress web design as freelancer and have had a few great guys help me out.
Zed
Saturday, January 14th, 2012 13:12
These are really guru in designing field. i love to see their work. True source for inspiration.
Jhony Bravo
Monday, September 19th, 2011 09:14
When ready access to the Internet today, websites are becoming the way that leads to obtain information about products and services. This is why it has become important for companies is the online presence via a website. Creating a website with functionality which may look nice overall but if not fulfilling the need of that particular business is something which you have made but does not create value for your online business.
Danny
Friday, October 28th, 2011 18:53
every day a lot people need your website for your company or for beging you own enterprise that is very good for have a lot traffic in you website
Eric Reiss
Saturday, May 21st, 2011 14:48
Fully a third of the folks on this list are CSS specialists. This is an incredibly skewed view of “influence on the web”. I would have hoped for a more well-rounded review.
Tina Zennand
Friday, May 20th, 2011 10:29
Amazing list! Thank you for such a useful article. Additional thanks for the links to these brilliant people’s websites and social profiles.
Susan Rubnsky
Wednesday, May 18th, 2011 05:05
No women?
Gavin
Tuesday, May 17th, 2011 17:57
I think you have completely hit the nail on the head with this list. I was expecting to see a list of the same ol’ people, but you’ve included people that have a major impact on web design and development! I’ve had the honour of working with some of the above in the past and they are truly brilliant people with a massive passion for this industry. Really pleased to see them getting the recognition they deserve!
Excellent post matey!
Hillary Hopper
Tuesday, May 17th, 2011 16:49
Dribbble is spelled with THREE B’s. ;)
Nice article.
Rean John Uehara
Tuesday, May 17th, 2011 17:15
Updated! Shame, that totally escaped me! Commits sepukku.
angel
Tuesday, May 17th, 2011 09:57
what about some clearleft guys?
Paul
Wednesday, May 18th, 2011 17:19
Nice article. Thought there would some women in there.
Sreejesh
Wednesday, May 18th, 2011 17:33
Great to learn about great web designers in the web. I’m a fan of many listed here especially Vitaly Friedman.
steve coultier
Friday, May 20th, 2011 00:09
and don’t forget the many talented girls and ladies. is there any designer out there who has not been impressed by verlee’s blog?
steve coultier
Friday, May 20th, 2011 00:07
amazing list! i could argue that it would be relevant to have a few of the most well known css template designers on such a list. those guys have created designs that have been used on millions of websites all over the world. if that is not influence, then what is? i’m thinking about people like andreas viklund, viktor ‘arcsin’ persson and nodethirtythree. and of course designers of the most used blog themes, like michael heilemann who created the kubrick theme for wordpress. but then again, a shortlist could easily grow into hundreds of names.
Rocket Bunny
Thursday, May 19th, 2011 11:04
Awesome list of creative and gifted men.
Michael Grindley
Thursday, May 19th, 2011 16:23
Great list, however, I would have to add Paul Irish.
Ross Hadden
Thursday, May 19th, 2011 23:16
+1.
Ryan
Friday, May 20th, 2011 02:46
+2