Today in Design - Top Articles RoundUp 21 October 2014

The day’s best and most impor­tant design- and design business-focused arti­cles, tuto­ri­als, and resources hand-picked by Pariah Burke.

  • Be Picky About Clients’ Future Potential When Freelancing
    When you’re a free­lancer, it’s tempt­ing to say yes to any oppor­tu­ni­ty that comes your way. However, it’s okay to be choosy and pick the clients you want to work with based on how much they can offer in the future.
  • 11 Great UI Designs
    Your UI design can make or break the suc­cess of your web­site or app: here’s how to get it right.
  • How Clutter Affects Your Brain (and What You Can Do About It)

    I was men­tal­ly exhaust­ed. I’d get home feel­ing that I hadn’t real­ly accom­plished any­thing. Once I left the agency and start­ed ooomf, I want­ed to fix how I approached con­sump­tion in my life. Over the last few years, I’ve dis­cov­ered ways to reduce the noise of stuff around me so I can focus on cre­ation and have more time for the things that mat­ter most. The last year has been the most pro­duc­tive of my life and I owe a lot of it to under­stand­ing the impor­tance of decreas­ing how much I con­sume and com­ing up with ways to cut clutter.

  • Design a killer logo in Illustrator
    Follow this guide by cre­ative Kyle Wilkinson and use Adobe Illustrator to cre­ate your own logos and present brand iden­ti­ties to clients.
  • How to Win Business from a Competitor Without Feeling Like a Jerk

    I promise, it’s not a jerk move — if you do it cor­rect­ly. In fact, I can assure you that your com­peti­tors have, are, or will be doing the very same thing. So you will need to revi­tal­ize your game if you want to com­plete a thor­ough com­pet­i­tive analy­sis that can help you assess the play­ing field. Here’s a look at five sim­ple ways to get started: