Corporate mastheads are evolving

An interesting trend has developed in the design of mastheads on corporate websites.

It seems that the larger the company, the smaller their logo and masthead tend to be. Companies with lots of self-confidence, such as Apple, Sun and Motorola, don't even bother with a traditional masthead; they integrate their logos into the main navigation area.

Apple:

Sun:

Motorola:

Websites that retain the masthead tend not to have any images in the masthead, but make do with a single colour or simple gradient (see Microsoft and CNN), or simply adequate white space (see Nokia Europe).

Microsoft:

CNN:

Nokia Europe:

On the other side of the spectrum, smaller companies tend to increase the size of their mastheads, and fill them with beautiful images of products and friendly people. No examples in this case, as I do not wish to hurt anyone's feelings – but it is almost a case of the smaller the company, the bigger the masthead. Do I sense a lack of self-confidence? Are they compensating for something? But I will drop this train of thought now, before I get myself into trouble.

Why do the big companies shrink their mastheads? Feeling secure is part of it, but I suspect the actual reason is that they want their visitors to focus on the content of the page, without getting distracted by colourful or striking mastheads.

Not long ago, I was involved with a corporate home page that featured three images: A large masthead that ran across the page, and below that, two much small images associated with feature stories. The effect was that the images competed for eye-attention. The eye often (but not always) looked at the masthead first, and then at the smaller images, bouncing back and forth between the three images. The problem is that there was not a single element that captured the eye and forced it to stop and pay attention. Robin Williams discussed this problem in the first few pages of her book, The Non-Designers Design Book (an entertaining but authoritative book that explains the principles of contrast, repetition, alignment and proximity).

In case you wondered: This specific home page has moved on in life. It now contains a single, (usually) striking image that leads the visitor's eye directly to the main content item on the page. The masthead is now a simple design that frames and balances the company logo on the pages, without calling much attention to itself. This masthead has been called boring by a few colleagues and they have a point, but hey, it does its job. I predict that it will become smaller and smaller over the years, until it disappears completely.