There’s a new face in the local mobile scene: Wind Mobile. While there’s a whole other conversation to be had about how this affects the Canadian mobile market, I’d like to talk about why I’m loving their website design. Lets break it down:

It leaves web 2.0 cliché’s behind
No gradients. No reflections. No drop shadows. No bevels. No buttons that look like they’re made of jolly ranchers. Wind keeps things fresh and simple with single colored buttons, flat graphics, and some whimsical little doodles. The few times gradients and product shadows are used, they’re handled very tastefully. It feels like this is where the new trend in good online design is and should be going.

Care for the typography
While I might deduct a couple points just for using the very much overused Gotham Rounded, I have to give them props for using non-standard web fonts appropriately. Until font embedding becomes standard across browsers, there are some rendering solutions (my current fave being Cufon) that work great, but shouldn’t be used outside of headlines, subheads, and pull quotes/introductory paragraphs. The site is very readable, with nice contrasts in sizing and nicely opened up leading.

It breathes
A lot of designers, and clients don’t understand the importance of white space. You need, need, NEED to let content breathe. In 2010 we are very much beyond (or should be beyond) arguments about content living above the fold. Just by using white space properly, you can divide and prioritize information without the need for additional elements like keylines or coloured blockings.

It’s just plain fun
From the copy, to the bold colour scheme, to the random scribble illustrations, it feels like the designers had fun with this. A lot of the time we like to climb onto our designer high horse and write-off these sorts of ideas as too-cheezy or brazen, but really, good design isn’t always so high-brow. Sometimes you need to exchange subtlety with loudness to get the job done, and Wind has done a great job of balancing those two extremes.

Now I won’t say the site is perfect. But while there are the odd things here and there I find strange looking, overall I think Wind Mobile has made a great visual impression with their recent launch. It feels very on point with where modern web design is heading, and for that I have to give kudos!

Couple more screencaps: